Black Lines To Battlefields
by crackers4jenn
Summary: Starts off at the end of Not Fade Away, but things don't go as planned. Will eventually be a Spuffy story.
1. Default Chapter

It was dark and dismal, rain pouring down like the bloody heavens above were giving them the two finger salute in response to their grand heroic gesture. Wasn't exactly a confidence booster, and didn't say much towards greater causes and all that rot. In all honesty, it looked rather bleak. Looked pointless, point in fact, but who was he to say? This was Angel's fight, and he'd aligned himself into that. Angel says it's for the greater good, Spike had to believe him. He had to believe in something, might as well be the Poof's one last drive at reformation and atonement. One last 'sod off' to the Powers That Wank that popped Spike back and threw him into this 'Hero of The People' role he never even wanted in the first place.

Honestly, he never thought he'd be doing this again; the noble sacrifice, the last attempt to make a difference. The first go around, dying all epic-like in Sunnydale, it was mostly for Buffy. Yeah, it was him who stayed at the bottom of the Hellmouth, him who wore the amulet and took out the ubervamps, watching as the place crumbled to dust before he soon followed in suite - but if it wasn't for her, if Buffy hadn't have asked him to wear the amulet, Spike wouldn't have done it. He wouldn't have done a lot of things if it wasn't for her; good, bad, soullessly-inclined either. But giving up his unlife, giving it up so she could live, that's what before was mostly about.

Now Spike stood alone in the darkened alley behind an abandoned building, hidden in the comfort of the shadows as he waited for the others. The rain came down in sheets around him, the ever-present cold setting in with it. All he had to do was wait for the rest of them to show up: Angel, Wes, Gunn, and Illyria. He was the first to get there, and after pushing aside the initial pride that came at knowing he got his job done first, he immediately started to worry about the others. And that right there was something he hadn't begun to get used to. Caring about people, about _these_ people. His colleagues, and on several alcohol-induced occasions, his friends.

He heard a noise off to his right; the sound of shoes pounding their way through puddles. Angel, of course, if the squeak of the lifts the Champ wore was any indication. There was a unique sense of drama and flair to him as he jogged his way into the alley, all dark avenger-like and big with the grand entrance.

Spike watched Angel look around worriedly a second or two before he gave in and stepped out of the corner, slipping out of the relative safety of the shadows and back into the downpour.

"Boo," he called out, catching the attention of Angel. You'd think, what with him being a vampire and all, he'd have sensed Spike in the shadows. Guess things really were dire, so much to the point that Angel couldn't even tell when his own kind was standing five feet away. The beasties were honing in on them, and Spike knew it - felt the tinglies up and down his spine, felt his chest tightening in anticipation. This was it. The bad was coming, and this was really it.

Angel drew in a deep breath, looking around expectantly. "Anybody else?"

"Not so far," Spike answered, still staring hard at him. "You feel the heat?" He sure as hell felt it, which was all sorts of ironic given the cold rain that continued to drench their already soaked bodies. His duster lay heavy on him, and the rain dripped from his hair in an annoying and constant rhythm. His boots were soaked through, bloody ruined, and his jeans and shirt clung to him; all of it weighing him down.

"It's coming," Angel slowly replied, turning to look down the alley.

Spike snorted. "Finally got ourselves a decent brawl."

Another noise off to the side caught both of their attention, and this time it was Gunn who came running into view, staggering and carrying his axe over his head triumphantly. "Damn, how did I know the fang boys would pull through? You're lucky we're on the same side, dogs, cause I was on _fire _tonight." His voice lowered, giving way to the obvious pain he was in, as he came closer. "My game was tight," he muttered, just before losing his balance. Spike and Angel immediately were at his side, pulling him to a box as they sat him down on it.

Spike smelt the blood all over Gunn, saw the deep wounds through his torn clothes. "You're supposed to wear the red stuff on the inside, Charlie boy," he joked, but his voice fell flat with the seriousness of it.

Gunn didn't bother with an acknowledgement. He looked up, the pain he was trying to hide written all across his face. "Any word on Wes?"

Just then, Illyria jumped down from the rooftops, joining their huddle.

"Wesley's dead," she told them, matter-of-factly. The way the words fell from her mouth, the hint of anguish in them that Spike didn't know she was even capable of feeling, added to his own instant sense of pain. They all shared a brief silence over their fallen friend, grasping to connect with the reality of it. Wesley was dead. The first one down tonight, and suddenly it was all too real. "I'm feeling grief for him," Illyria continued bitterly. "I can't seem to control it. I wish to do more violence."

That was the language he understood - violence, carnage, mayhem. The sudden weight that had been put on Spike with the knowledge of Wes' death momentarily lifted. The tightening in his chest loosened and the tingling up and down his back became less evident as the legion o' Big Bads closed in on them. "Well," he drawled in response, glancing down the alleyway towards the oncoming demons. "Wishes just happen to be horses today."

"Among other things," Angel muttered.

Slowly and together, they turned towards the horde of beasties coming at them, unrelentingly, as far back as he could see and feel. A dragon swooped over their heads, screeching loudly as it fluttered above them, its massive clawed wings flapping up and down in a fast, painful looking rhythm. Every sort of demon was on the menu tonight; it was bloody hell on earth. Was worse than Sunnydale, worse than the bottom of the Hellmouth. At least then the baddies were contained. At least then it was just vampires they were dealing with, and, lucky for Spike, he'd been surrounded by an entire girlband of tiny Slayers, not to mention Buffy. He'd had the amulet that did everything, took them all out, so all he had to do was stand there and wait for the burning to stop. Now... was pointless. The demons were just going to keep coming until the last of their bodies hit the ground, until the last of their dust washed away with the rain.

"Okay, you take the 30,000 on the left..." Gunn joked, bent over and still gripping his side tight.

Illyria looked down at him, scoffing. "You're fading. You'll last ten minutes at best."

Gunn sucked in hard, slowly standing up beside them. The pain he was in wasdeep enough for Spike to sense as he stumbled to join them. It hit him with a bit of respect, as Charlie struggled to straighten. "Then let's make 'em memorable."

Together they stood, the sounds of an Apocalypse growing closer. Howls and screams flooded the alley, the rain doing nothing to drown out the intensity and volume of it.

"So, in terms of a plan?" Spike asked tentatively, keeping an intent eye on the demons.

"We fight," Angel answered simply.

"Bit more specific," Spike pressed. A vague thought briefly flickered through his mind: he didn't have any weapons on him. Angel had a sword, all typically phallic-shaped as he took on the voiceless unofficial role of Leader, Gunn had the battle-axe he'd arrived with, Illyria had her time-warp mojo and that fun bit of strength he remembered all too well from previous training sessions with her - but Spike didn't have anything. His mission Angel had sent him on didn't exactly require a weapon. Steal the baby, fight off the sorry excuses for a clan that came at him, and get the hell out of there. Grabbing a weapon hadn't even crossed his mind as he safely made his way to the alley for the big group meet-up.

That was probably going to cost him his unlife a bit earlier than he'd hoped.

Angel stepped forward, drawing the hand wielding his sword up close as the demons fell upon them. "Well, personally," he answered. "I kinda wanna slay the dragon." A pause, all in the sake of it being dramatic, as the demons continued to swarm closer. Then, he lifted the sword and smirked. "Let's go to work." He finished the sentence with a swipe of his sword and the battle began.

It all blurred to black and red as Spike lunged forward, an animalistic growl escaping from his lips as his fists made their first connection. He spent no time on the first vampire he encountered, punching it in its face before quickly screwing off its head, moving onto the next before he'd missed a beat. Beside him, Angel's sword clanked loudly on the thick skin of some of the bigger demons. The loud, breathy grunts to his left told him Charlie was still in it, holding his own. Illyria was further into the alley, effortlessly taking on three and four demons at a time.

Spike couldn't help the grin that spread across his face as he charged further into the swarm, picking up a pry bar he found laid forgotten off to the side.

"Well, lookie what I found," he drawled appreciatively to a group of demons surrounding him. "Looks like ol' Spike isn't as weaponless as you thought," he breathed out, spinning around before the last of the words had left his mouth. He swung the bar down like a baseball bat, knocking over two of the charging demons. It sent them toppling over each other, and Spike had the pleasure of hearing the distinct sound of bone crunching when they hit the pavement.

Before he had time to crack a smile, he felt a blow to the back of his legs. He stumbled forward a foot or two before catching his balance, and ducked down instinctively as a clawed arm swung over his head, just missing contact. He clicked his tongue in disapproval as he jumped to his feet, whirling around, and jabbed the metal rod through the chest of the attacking demon, letting the pained yell of the demon mix with his own cry of adrenaline as he pulled it back out.

They were going down, no doubt about that, but fuck did it feel good.

He turned around, his back suddenly to Angel's. "Looks like that dragon's still circling above," he felt obligated to point out, growling as he dropped a kick to a vampire. The vampire fell backwards, taking down a few others with him, as Spike turned to his left, dodging another aimed blow at his head.

"Just saving the best for last," Angel grunted, swiping his own sword in a steady rhythm through limbs and various body parts.

Spike smiled, turning away and focusing on a new bunch of demons that encircled him. "This is rather sad," he told them, breathing in hard. "Whatever happened to fair play? It's the whole lot of you, against the four of us. That lacks all sort of battle etiquette." He grinned, raising his eyebrows upwards with a small 'bugger all' type shrug. "Then again, sod the bloody etiquette."

And with that, he threw himself into the thick of it again, swinging the pry bar around defensively, happy when the thing made any bit of contact. He felt fangs and claws shred through the thick layers of his duster and shirt, the pain temporarily numbing, but he lunged forward, willing himself to not stop. If he stopped, they'd trap him. Hone in on his weakness and take him down that way.

"Gunn!"

Angel's voice caught his attention as he pulled back from an attacking Fomes demon, and he turned his head in the direction that it came from just in time to see Gunn falling to the ground.

"Bloody hell," Spike muttered, and instinctively took off. He kicked through a wall of demons, punching past and pushing through, and jogged up to Gunn's side. Without hesitation, he dropped his makeshift weapon and grabbed Gunn by the underside of his arms, dragging him backwards through the alley littered with the bodies of the few demons they'd managed to kill until he felt the solidity of a wall behind him. He didn't have time to be doing this, there were too many baddies already on them and they weren't looking to stop any time soon, but he couldn't just leave Gunn out there. Not where he'd get trampled and forgotten. Wasn't a hero's way to go. "Charlie," he called out, quickly pushing Gunn up against the wall beside the boxes he hoped would cover him just enough to not be noticed. "Stay here, alright. Don't move."

"Spike?" Gunn lifted his head, blinking fast and hard. "It hurts," he choked out, grabbing his side. Blood stained his clothes and seeped through his fingers, the rain doing nothing to thin the steady stream of it.

"Yeah, well who'da thunk being ripped at by beasties would do that," Spike drawled sarcastically, eliciting a pained laugh out of Gunn. He leaned forward, pushing Gunn up against the wall one last time. "Stay here, you're gonna be fine, alright? Angel's out there, whacking away with the rage of a bloody hundred-man army, and we all know how well Angel does with the whacking." He straightened, grinning, and started to back away from Gunn, back out towards the fight. With a smirk, he added, "Good thing that soul clause has a loophole for happiness of the self-inflicted kind."

"Hey." Gunn pushed himself up, leaning on his elbows. He coughed and winced from the effort, his breaths coming out more ragged. "Here, man," he forced out, tossing his battle-axe to Spike. Spike caught it, pausing to stare at Gunn, shocked and grateful. Gunn's arms gave way and he collapsed back down, clutching at the hole in his chest and stomach again. "Go give him hell, for Wes and Fred."

After a nod and one last glance, Spike turned back around, only making it a few feet before he was completely surrounded by another collection of demons. "This is getting real old, real quick," he sighed, his chest tightening as they closed in on him. They snarled at him, some hissing, all trying to look menacing as they started to pounce.

Before the inevitable attack, one of the ciircling demons just in front of him screamed out in pain. His head came clean off the next second as a sword swiped through his neck, sending his headless body toppling limply to the ground below. A quick glance upwards and Spike saw Angel smiling at him, in place of where the demon had just stood. "Hi," the Champ smirked, before spinning around and disappearing back into the mass of blackness without another word.

Spike didn't hesitate as he raised the axe upwards, swinging down hard and making all sorts of squishy contact with random body parts behind him. Bastard demons, circling him. He grinned appreciatively as the axe cut through with relative ease, carrying on without stopping to bask in the feel of it.

He sensed Angel again as he slammed through a bunch of demons beside him. "Hey, Champ," he called out breathlessly, spinning around and using his momentum to forcefully kick three more attacking demons away from him. He straightened, gripping the axe at his side tight as he stopped fighting for a few calming seconds. "What do you say after we finish up here, you give me that Viper, for real this time. Think a noble sacrifice such as this merits a nice shiny, red power-engine reward." He growled out the last words as he got knocked in the face, the force of it sending him staggering backwards, running him into several other vampires in the process.

"Yeah," Angel ground out, taking several kicks in the stomach. He spun around, and in the time it took Spike to rid himself of his trio of attacking vamps, the Poof had taken out his own as well. "But you're missing the whole idea behind the word 'sacrifice'." He ducked down just as a wooden stake aimed for his heart flew over his head, barely missing being dusted. "They've got stakes?" Angel complained, completely unimpressed as he quickly straightened. "That lacks all kinds of etiquette, especially given the good guy-to-bad guy ratio."

"That's what I said," Spike laughed, breathing it out hard. He was pushed forward, feeling fists connect with the back of his head, but ignored it all the same as he righted himself. "They're not stopping," he cried out in the general direction of Angel. He raised the blunt end of the axe upwards and dropped it back down in one swift motion, hitting the demon behind him as it came down hard. "It's like they sent out the whole bloody lot of the underworld - Agaric demons, the Order of Taraka, sodding Carrion and Flarat demons--"

"The Scourge," Angel added, nodding his head towards a group of uniform-clad demons marching silently towards them.

"Bloody hell!" Spike punctuated his frustration with a few punches, before leaning back on his heels, observing the chaos playing out before his eyes. Hard not to appreciate it, all things considered. "I bet some of them Initiative wankers are filtered throughout here," he muttered bitterly. "Bleeding governmental toy soldiers." He caught the sight of unmistakable blue leather out of the corner of his eye, grabbing his attention. "Hey, Blue," he called out, turning towards Illyria. "Gramps needs help." He nodded towards Angel, who had stumbled over and was quickly being surrounded by an assortment of demons, none of them looking like they just wanted to talk.

Illyria raised her head upwards in defiance, clearly not pleased with him ordering her around. Eventually she walked off without protest, headed in Angel's direction, her arms raised in front of her as she batted away the smaller demons stupid enough to charge her.

A roar caught Spike off guard, and in a blur of claws and palely colored flesh, he was knocked down hard. Gunn's axe dislodged from his grip as he hit the ground with a painful thud, a Suvolte demon quickly climbing its way on top of him. Bloody great. He hated these things, on account of that whole mishap with the Slayer and the ex-Soldier back in Sunnydale a few years before, and this one here wasn't earning it any bit of credibility by sitting on him.

The demon reared back, elbow jutted out and fist clenched tight, and growled as he came down, punching Spike in the face with enough power to split his lip open. Kept punching, again and again, undeterred by Spike's weak efforts to pull himself free. He felt the blows in painful detail, his head bouncing hard off the pavement each time his face connected with knuckles, the blood pouring out of his mouth and sputtering upwards from the force. The exhaustion he'd been too energized to feel started to settle in in traitorous form. He tried to move, but was pinned entirely underneath the weight of the heavy demon. He tried to look around to see if Angel or Illyria were near enough to pull the thing off of him, tried to call out for help, but his words died on his lips, drowned out by his own blood.

He could feel unconsciousness looming behind closed eyelids every time he blinked, and... fuck, this wasn't how he wanted to go. He'd hardly made an impact in the number of demons they'd killed, hardly made any difference at all. This wasn't grand or heroic, it was sad and pathetic - and bugger that if he was just gonna let this sorry-fuck of a demon sit on top of him and beat him into unconsciousness. Might as well rip open his shirt and draw a straight line to his heart and end his unlife now, a bloody step-by-step guide to staking him.

He growled, the demon inside awoken and royally pissed off, and began to struggle underneath the green lard of about-to-have-its-ass-kicked on top of him, thrashing wildly until the punching stopped. He bucked his hips upwards, and when the demon on top of him tensed in surprise, he used that leverage to roll himself onto his side, grabbing the leg of the demon and ripping it off of him in one fluid motion.

Free, he jumped up, adrenaline heightening his senses as he bent over and picked up his battle-axe. He didn't even have time to whack off any of the demon's parts in retaliation before he was hit again, the force of the blow sending him stumbling sideways into a group of demons, all who looked none too pleased by his sudden presence. He caught himself before he could topple over, straightening as he sucked in an unneeded breath ofair, and swallowed the bit of blood he inhaled by doing so. "Evenin', ladies," he drawled pantingly, and was quickly ducking the next second as fists shot out. He dodged their arms and squeezed in between their bodies until he was no longer enclosed, only stopping long enough to toss his elbow behind him and feel it connect with one of their heads before he ran, fumbling towards the place he last saw Illyria and Angel.

He came upon Illyria first, her standing in the same spot he'd last left her and looking stone-faced with her head cocked to the side. He looked around for Angel, not seeing the billowy black coat or feeling the familiar tingling that told him family was near. "Where's the Champ, Blue?" he asked, out of breath, as he wiped the still flowing blood off of his lip with his free arm.

They stood there for long seconds, on the outskirts of a battle that was still raging on despite their lack of presence. The only sound heard was his shallow breathing as he deeply inhaled, sharply exhaled, panting from exhaustion.

Illyria did nothing but tilt her head even further to the side, as if she was contemplating what to say. Finally, with an impartial squint, she pointed to the ground. He followed her thin finger until his weary eyes focused on a lone sword settled amongst demon parts and spotted with blood. It took him a second before he noticed the thick layer of dust that the sword lay upon, the blood clumping the dust up in small, red balls.

"Your leader was killed," she spoke out evenly. "He called for me, but I was too late. He was dust before I had arrived at his side."

Spike's head spun, his stomach rebelling against him as he stared at the dust. Angel's dust. Bloody hell. Bloody fucking hell. He tore his gaze away from the ground, the sense of loss overwhelming, and turned to look at Illyria, suddenly reminded of Gunn who he'd left laying for dead and hell-knows-what in the back corner of the alley. "Gunn?"

He tried to move then, tried to run to check on Gunn, see if maybe he was still alive, if maybe the demons had left him alone, but his legs didn't want to work with him. They were dead, useless, holding him to this one spot against his will. And then everything started to slow down around him, everything muting down to a deafening silence. The demons who were at once in constant movement were now hardly moving, everything being played out in an exaggeratedly slow pace. The rain that had incessantly been falling had now seemingly stopped altogether. The noises that had filled the alley, the screams and varying other battle cries from the assortment of collected demons, had now cut off completely.

Spike sucked in hard at the realization of what was happening. Illyria was working her time-warp mojo on them.

Before he could think to protest, let alone think to question it all, a sudden stab of pain hit him, and he dropped Gunn's axe, clutching at his side. He looked up, blinking back the pain, and saw that Illyria was staring intently at him. Unvoiced questions were being asked behind her eyes, but before he could catch them, her right hand had clamped down on his forearm. An instant sort of 'Oh, shit!' feeling came over him, knowing that this wasn't just a hand being offered for support, and when his gaze jumped back up to hers, she was already looking away.

He opened his mouth and widened his eyes, needing to stop her, but her hand was already making a circular movement, and in the next instant, before any sound could pass between his lips, everything had turned white. It felt like the world gave way beneath his feet and he felt himself tumbling forward, a sense of weightlessness surrounding him until Illyria's hold on him loosened. His eyes slammed shut, popping back open just as quickly, the familiar solidness of the ground back in place the next second.

"Bloody hell," he growled as soon as he was sure that she had stopped working her magic. He blinked, trying to force away the white that clouded his sight. Everything was too calm, too quiet to be the alleyway. There was no rain, no screams, no tension. He couldn't feel a bloody thing, and the nagging instinctive feeling in his gut that something was off wasn't easing his rising anxiety. "Blue," he shouted, trying to get a sense for her nearness. "What the _bloody hell_ did you do!"

He looked around for the first time, the white in his eyes having reduced itself to just sporadic blotches of brightness every time he blinked, and... what the bloody fuck? This couldn't be right. He blinked, spinning around as he looked around him disbelievingly. They were in a cemetery. Not just any cemetery, this was _his_ cemetery. This was Sunnydale.

"Illyria!" he called out, only then noticing that she wasn't at his side. He spun around again, his duster flapping at his sides. "Blue!" he yelled, and again got nothing. Not a good sign that he'd lost his tour guide. And speaking of - where the hell _was_ he? Sunnydale, yeah - but how? Sunnydale was dust, as in no longer in existence, as in big, huge crater that he personally could avow for given the fact that he was the one who created the bleeding hole to begin with.

"Spike?"

Spike whirled around to the direction that all-too familiar voice came from. His heart - he was pretty damn sure - skipped a nonexistent beat as he drew in a deep breath, seeing a figure bathed in moonlight a couple hundred feet away. He knew that figure. He knew that voice. He knew that golden hair that shone from the dim lights that lined the walkway of the cemetery, and he sure as hell knew just who it was causing that instantaneous tightness in both his chest and pants.

"Buffy?"


	2. Altered State

_"Look," Angel started, staring at Spike with his hands on his hips. "This is important, okay? So you two," His gaze jumped across the room to Illyria, who was standing on the opposite side of the training room with her hands hung tightly against her sides, "both need to find some kind of mutual ground and meet there."_

_"Mutual ground," Spike scoffed, dismissing the idea quickly. "She uses that time-slowing mojo every five minutes! I can't record a bleeding thing because it's all, 'Got kicked in the face, just a spot before she slowed down time' - it's redundant, and not at all useful._You_ need to tell her to lay off it, or I'm done - you can find somebody else to _train_ with her."_

_"You speak as though I am not in the room."_

_Both Angel and Spike's heads turned in Illyria's direction at the sound of her voice._

_"You speak as though I can not hear you," she continued, her blue eyes blazing._

_"Right," Angel said dismissively, turning back to Spike. He took a step backwards, pulling open the door behind him. "Just do it, Spike. It's training with Illyria, not that big of a deal. It's like training with Buffy, only... bluer."_

_Spike snorted. "Yeah, and much nicer to the nose." His face scrunched up in annoyance. "And Buffy didn't have that pause-and-stop trick. _She_ fought fairly."_

_"Handle it, Spike." With a decidedly smug grin spread across his face, Angel backed out of the room and closed the door soundly behind him, leaving the two of them alone for another fun round of one-sided ass-kicking._

_Spike sighed as he plucked a pen out of his duster pocket. He bent over, picking up the clipboard that had been knocked to the ground in one of his and Illyria's earlier altercations, and couldn't help but wince as he straightened and things internally shifted about painfully. Ribs were probably broken, or bruised at the least. Just because he had to get stuck with the training._

_"You heard the Boss, Blue. No more doing that slowing-down thing you do." He flipped through the pages of the clipboard, them lined with the notes he'd been taking as a sort of analysis on the she-God, scribbledbits of information he figured would be useful. He set the pen right where he left off, and looked up at Illyria expectantly. "Right, so we left off with you hitting me really hard. Loadsa power packed tight in those fists of yours. I leapt at you, all ferocious-like, and was on my way to landing a powerful kick when you slowed down time. You cheated, is what I'm saying. So, that's where we're at now." He lifted his head, looking at her from under a hooded gaze. "What else you hiding under that leather, pet?"_

_Illyria cocked her head to the side as she began stepping forward. Each step looked awkward, seemingly-calculated (so he'd pointed out in his notes earlier), and she was shortening the distance between them in no time. Her gaze never wavered off of his. "You trained with another?" she asked, slowly walking around him. "Another as powerful as I?"_

_Spike watched her as she moved behind him, not bothering to turn around when she disappeared from view. "Not many as powerful as you," he answered thinly. "But powerful, yeah."_

_She came back around to his side, continuing in her route of circling him. "And this is why you hold back?"_

_Spike's hand shot up, his clipboard clutched tight . "Hang on," he cried out, offended at her implications. "I don't _hold back_. And maybe if I wasn't so worried about you getting your Morphin time on, I wouldn't need to. Or does that only work if you have the Pink and Red Rangers here, too?"_

_She stopped in front of him. "I speak vaguely of this powerful one you've trained with..." She tilted her downwards as she met his eyes. "Buffy," she continued slowly, experimentally, observing his reaction. "And you tense. Your entire body goes rigid, I can sense the tightness in your muscles."_

_"Yeah, what of it?"_

_"It's disgusting. You are weak."_

_"And you," he ground out, taking a threatening step forward. "Don't know a bloody thing about it."_

_"I know that the mention of this..." Her words cut off, and she lifted her head in disgust, "_human_ ... effects you."_

_Spike snorted, loudly and dismissively. "Rubbish out of your mouth that doesn't start with 'In my time'? It's impressive, really."_

_"You're defensive."_

_"I am not," he shot back. "Just don't care to hear you speechifying about things you know nothing about."_

_"I spoke this... Buffy's name, and you stared at me in much the same way Wesley stares at me at the mention of the previous owner of this shell's body." She motioned downwards at herself emotionlessly, emphasizing the 'body' she was so intent and casual about pointing out._

_"Like I want to rip your very existence out of it?" he growled lowly. "Tear you out of there 'til it's no longer you, and back to Fred?"_

_Illyria stared at him defiantly. A flicker of acceptance flashed across her eyes before she stepped back. "I could take you to her. This human who affects you. You could see her again."_

_"Look, Blue," Spike sighed, narrowing his skeptical eyes at her. "I don't know what mind games you're playing at here, but it isn't working. And what's with the whole foray into feelings, anyway? Thought your Godliness was above all that?"_

_She scoffed, her own body tensing. "I care not of this feeling you have for her, or any feelings at all for that matter. It is sickeningly human, to be consumed so deeply by something other than power, to care for something that is not a God--"_

_"Which is why you, not two seconds ago, offered to take me to her?"_

_She lifted her head as if she'd been challenged, as if he had said exactly what she had wanted him to say. "You killed my Qua Ha' Zan."_

_At that, Spike laughed, nodding his head at the realization of her words. "I get it. So this was just your incredibly long-winded way of saying, poor she-God's sad her fanboy met the metallic end of a few well-aimed bullets, and now you want another one? Sorry, pet - don't really do the whole 'groupie' thing."_

_"Very well," she responded, with an impartial shrug. "You hold no interest to me as it is." A hard punch to Spike's stomach punctuated just how little he meant to her._

_He had no time to react, her movement quick and sudden. Before he could even register the feel of her fist with his gut, he was alreadylaying in a painful heap against the base of the unpadded training room wall. Spike stayed there for a few seconds, adjusting to being punched across the room in the half second it took him to blink, before he made any attempt to move. Waited until the throbbing in his head dulled down to a tolerable sort. Sucking in hard, he sat up and rose to his knees. After a few more seconds to fully gain his composure, he snatched the clipboard off the ground and pushed himself upwards, standing on shaky legs._

_"Diversion tactic of the psychological kind," he growled out, searching the floor for his pen. "Don't think I'm not writing that down." _

_----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Things like this were always happening to Spike.

Flashbacked in time by Illyria? Why the hell not! Because who was he to ever have any sort of say in what happened to him? Governmental piece of plastic shoved into his brain? No, didn't need his permission for that - castrate the Big Bad with sodding technology for all he cared! Shove him into this... this White Hat role, stick him in with a group of bloody annoying Scoobies, mold him into this love-hate relationship with the Slayer - couldn't give a piss about it!

Saving the world, too? Finally getting the girl of his every current dream to whisper to him the words he'd longed to hear most while her small fingers wove between his, their eyes locked together? Dying in that moment a hero, loved? And then having all that taken away in the blink of an eye-- in the bleeding two seconds it took to pop out of some amulet? All the meaning behind his death, behind his sacrifice, everything that he'd given up for it, for _her, _and it all got stripped away. No choice in the matter on his part, but hey - big surprise there!

This, though? This was the icing on the cake. This was... this was just too fucking typical.

"Spike?"

Buffy's one word drew him out of his internal-rant, snapping his attention back to her with as much efficiency as a sudden dose of sunlight. She stood there in front of him, her arms folded across her chest in that familiarly agitated way as she stared long and hard at him from a few dozen feet away, making no effort to cross the distance between them. Her eyes were dark, her mouth thin in that little line of reliable fury, annoyance written all over her face.

God help him, she was beautiful.

"Buff--" he started, and then quickly stopped, his eyes shifting downwards as he caught sight of the stake she held that was being tapped impatiently against her forearm. "Slayer," he quickly amended, glancing back upwards.

She narrowed her eyes, tilting her head slightly to the right, and continued to stare at him. The silence stretched between them, and he had no idea where they were going with this. She was going to stake him? Were they back to that, were they supposed to fight? His brain was wracking through all the possible scenarios, none of them currently all that pleasing, what with the heavy amount of confusion and the fun little aches and pains that carried over from whence he came.

Slowly, her arms fell to her sides and she breathed out loudly. "You okay?" she asked, tucking the stake into her back pocket as she started to walk towards him. "I thought you were being attacked or something."

His mouth opened and closed a good two or three times before he could force out any sort of sound. To say he was surprised was giving him a hell of a lot of credit - he was bloody dumbstruck. "What?" he finally managed, the word sounding broken and ragged even to him. He started to tense, feeling her and sensing her as she closed the gap between them. His mind was racing, his thoughts everywhere, but nothing was connecting.

"I heard you yelling," Buffy answered, casually coming to a stop just in front of him. "I heard you--" Her voice cut off suddenly and her eyebrows knitted together as her eyes dropped from his, to his chest. "Why are you..." She leaned forward, reaching one of her small little hands out. He watched, taking everything in in achingly slow detail, as she gently touched his duster, her palm flat as she pressed her fingers down. His throat cut off then, disbelief kicking in, not entirely sure this was actually happening. Felt like forever that she just stood there, frowning, touching him, but it was likely only a few seconds. He swallowed hard when her gaze fluttered back up to his, that brow of hers still drawn together. "You're wet."

Her mouth moved, but everything was silent to him, everything was muted aside from the steady lull of her heart pounding in his ears. She squinted hard at him as she looked back at his chest, pressing carefully again into his duster in a way that sent an instant flow of blood rushing to his more reactive parts. And then slowly her words came filtering through his muddled brain, playing back in his mind as they registered with him, and - he was wet? He swallowed, taking a shaky breath. Now that she mentioned it, his shirt was still damp and clinging to his skin, his jeans were uncomfortably tight and wound against him. He glanced downwards for a visual verification of what he felt, a sort of reminder that this was real and prior events had happened. Her hand pulled back, little flash of tan skin, and it snapped him out of his reverie. He matched her confused look with one of his own, narrowing his eyes and frowning as he glanced back up at her. "Uh, right--"

"Oh my god," she cut him off, stepping forward quickly until she was just inches away. Breathed out a few little breaths of scorching air into the crook of his neck. "You're hurt." She looked at him worriedly, their eyes connecting, and then once again her warm hand was on him. She gently pried open his duster, pulling the heavy, wet leather away from him as she took in his appearance. Her hand floated over his chest, ghosting over the ripped pieces of fabric that once made up a perfectly good shirt. The blood had stopped flowing, deep wounds from claws and fangs were already closing, bruises from fists already healing. Still, he couldn't help but flinch when her hand finally made brief contact, touching a bruised area around his ribs in a concerned way. Had nothing to do with pain, though. She sucked in air through her teeth when he winced, breathing it out slowly as she looked back into his eyes. "What happened?"

"Right," he started again, but couldn't particularly find the words to explain. Her hand still rested against him, fingers still softly searching, and he couldn't think like that. Not with her so near, and not with her touching him. Not with what he knew and what she'd said before - before all of this, before Los Angeles, and-- _bloody hell_.He stared at her for a few seconds while she looked up at him, waiting for him to talk, to explain, to make sense of it all, but his mouth was still ineffectively not connecting with his brain.

"You're hurt," she repeated, pulling her hand away. "And why are you wet?"

With her hand now tucked back against her side, he could properly think again. Only now that he could, he was wishing his mind was back in that complacent place of just a few seconds ago. How was he going to explain this to her? His mind hadn't even wrapped around what the hell was going on - everything happened so fast and so forcefully, it'd all kind of left him a bit... baffled, honestly. He knew he'd jumped back in time, or jumped dimensions. Pretty bloody obvious, what with Sunnydale and Buffy being there in front of him. But he was going to explain that to her how?

Suddenly, he turned around fast. He heard the surprise gasp from Buffy at his movement, but he quickly shut her out. He looked back and forth, his eyes darting between headstones and trees as he looked for Illyria. Bloody she-God had to be around somewhere, and he was going to find her, get her to get them back. He stepped forward, his eyes glistening of amber as he fought away the urge to vamp to get a better feel of his surroundings.

"Spike?"

He spun back around, startling her again. She fell back a few cautious steps as he dwindled down the space between them with a couple of quick strides. "I need to find Illyria..." he told her, fast and out of breath. "I need to get out of here, back to LA."

A frown slowly thinned her lips. "Spike, calm down. Who's Illyria? And why do you need to be in LA?"

Spike nearly laughed at her complete air of nonchalance. Calm down? He'd like to see_her_ calm down, were the situation reversed. "Blue," he clarified shortly, not bothering to elaborate.

There was a good moment of silence that passed between them as they both stared expectantly at one another. Her waiting for an answer he didn't feel like giving, and him waiting for her to just nod her pretty little head and go along with him.

"Spike," she finally started again, eying him suspiciously. "Are you okay? Because you're acting all sorts of the sane that's not."

This time he let the laugh pass his lips. "Right, yeah. Perfectly okay. Just got mojoed to hell knows when, but other than that? Fine, just bloody fine."

Hysteria _might_ be setting in.

Buffy stared hard at him, squinting her eyes in another show of confusion. "I... I think maybe the chip--"

"The chip?" he interrupted, snorting out derisively. "I've still got the bloody _chip_ here?" He turned around in disgust, walking away once again. It occurred to him that it didn't exactly matter what kind of neutered shadow of his former self he was in this other dimension or time or altered whatever reality - _he_ didn't have the chip. But he was irrational and pissed, and seeing her again was all fine and instantly warming and would serve as a good last image to keep with him in his days of Eternal Hell - but he'd played along long enough and was ready to get back to where he came from, back to LA, back to the death he had waiting for him.

He only went a few feet before he stopped abruptly. He wheeled back around and started to pace. His steps were hard as he gave into the frustration and sudden bit of panic that welled up inside. With every step, his wet jeans clung against his skin, rubbing against his legs uncomfortably - but fuck if he cared. His whole world had just been flipped upside down and rearranged, and hell if he knew what to do about it.

"No," Buffy finally said, carefully enunciating the word, drawing it out until it was at least three bleeding syllables long. "We got the chip removed. Remember?" He grunted a response, tossing her a sideways glance mid-pace. She stepped forward, walking towards him, and it caught his attention, immediately stopping him. Instinctively, he shuffled backwards, drawing out the space between them even as she moved closer. He didn't notice the way she winced as he forcefully backed away, only the resolute face he saw when he looked back at her. "Maybe this is a side effect of that," she continued, voicing her thoughts out loud. "Or, maybe it's something the First is doing?"

Chip? The First? Just bloody great. Should've figured. He knew he'd been flashed back to a time when him and Buffy weren't the mortalist of enemies, what with his current state of non-dustiness, but to be popped back into _this_ time? He was going to snap Blue's neck when he saw her again. Throw that scrawny little leather-clad body across the room and tear off her bloody head. Maybe rip off that arm that did the circling thing that popped him here.

So - options, options. What the hell was he going to do?

Option the First was to swallow away any sense of logic and play along in this world. Spike was a vampire. Theoretically speaking, he would be living for bloody ever - what's another year tacked on, freely given? He could go about here. Lie to her, to everyone. Chock up everything she'd just witnessed to temporary side-effects of brain-fucking Firsts and soldiers performing open-surgery on him to remove little bits of plastic from his head.

Unlikely. Not that it wouldn't be nice, being by her side and all-- without the blocking shadow of The Immortal, current boyfriend of choice. It seemed wrong, though. Too easy.

The second option, the one most likely to earn him a trip backto her lovely bedroom, held and tied to the more finer and sturdier of chairs, was to admit what the hell he'd just been put through. Then again, that option required him actually _having_ some sort of clue of what he'd just been put through.

That one was the 'suicidal' package. Came bonus with the extra added fact that he'd be securing his place in Hell the second he popped back to Los Angeles.

"Spike,"Buffy slowly said, looking concerned. "What's going on with you?"

He sighed, and decided to just come clean with it. "I don't belong here, Buffy."

Her body tensed at his words, and suddenly the look of hers shifted from concerned into offence. She carefully folded her arms across her chest. "Is it because you have the chip out now?" Her voice was defensive, and he could sense the smallest trace of hurt in her words. Or, maybe she didn't care at all. Maybe they only sounded that way because he was pissed and tired and he'd wanted them to. "You're not gonna go back to..."

"Back to what?" he asked back slowly, drawing each word out.

Her silence was answer enough.

"Back to killing?" He snorted, offended. "That's what you think? You think that after all I've done to do better, to be better,I'd give it up just because I finally got that sodding chip out?" That hurt. And it pissed him off. Being back here wasn't exactly working wonders for his psyche. Now he remembered why he'd spent the last eight months trying to move on. Suddenly it all came painfully back to him why he never tried harder to get to Rome, to get to her. Put the soul back in the previously soulless monster, but it still doesn't matter to her.

"No," she breathed out heavily, making sure he was looking at her. "If I thought that, I wouldn't have had them do it. You know that."

"Right," he countered bitterly. "Which is why you just went and sputtered out the implication that you think I would?"

"I know, I... look, can we not talk about this now? Giles is waiting, the Potentials..."

"Yeah, about that - _I told you_, I don't belong here. Giles, the Potentials... Lived that hell once, don't really care to repeat it."

"Spike, I don't know what you're--"

"So, you can just toddle on to your watcher," he continued, motioning her forward. "Let him know that I'm gonna need his and Red's help, more than likely. I'm gonna stay and look around for Blue, see if I can find where she disappeared off to." He turned around again, leaving her with her mouth slightly open, and stalked off in the direction he'd come from.

"Bloody she-God," he muttered to himself, his thoughts once again settling back on Illyria as he gave the cemetery another once-over. "Thinks just because she _has_ the power, she can _use_ the power." Buffy was still behind him, not making any effort to move, so he turned back around to her - needing to vent, and vent loudly. "You know, contrary to the miles I've tacked on, I don't particularly fancy being popped in and out by the Higher Powers whenever they feel like it. The Powers That Wank's little go at me was one thing - appreciated it, even. Gave me a third life, and let's face it, not even_I'm_ stupid enough to complain about that. But Illyria pulling this?" He laughed bitterly to himself, shaking his head in disgust. "...And here I thought Wes zapped all that out of her." That recollection set off a reminder of what happened to Wes back in LA. And Angel and Gunn, and _fuck._ He had to get out of here, he had to get back - they needed him.

There was another tense moment of silence before Buffy spoke. "Wes?" she asked, her voice flat. "How do you know Wes?"

"Percy? Head boy?" He laughed again, this time the sound a bit lighter. "You can say we sort of go back. Or, I guess, regarding my new state of Ghost of Christmas Future - we go forward."

"What does that mean--"

"Look, I _told you_. I don't belong here. This place?" He gestured unenthusiastically around the dark cemetery. "Sunnydale? It doesn't exist. It's dust. Big, huge lifeless crater in the ground, created in part by yours truly. It's a not-so-pleasant memory, one that I've happily been suppressing the past eight months. I don't need this now, don't particularly want it either. Now, you run off and find that Watcher of yours, and I'll check back in a bit."

Then he was turning and walking away again, leaving a very confused Buffy. He'd only gone a few steps before he heard her again.

"Spike," she called out, walking fast until she was directly behind him. "I'm not just going to leave you here. You're wet and hurt, and--"

"And what? Talking the crazy talk? Gone a bit mad? Am off my rocker?" He turned to look at her as she pulled up to his side, matching his fast stride. "Look, I know you don't understand, Buffy, _I_ don't even understand, but I'm telling you this isn't real. I don't belong here, and I sure as hell don't want to stay stuck here."

She grabbed his arm, pulling him to a dead stop and sharply turning him towards her. "Spike, what the _hell_ are you talking about!" she yelled out, dropping her hand from his arm in annoyance. "Will you just stop and tell me what the hell happened to you!"

He sighed loudly, frustrated, making sure to breathe out every bit of unneeded air that floated around in his lungs in an exaggerated fashion. His head was pounding, his ribs suddenly aching. He was supposed to be dead now. He'd mentally prepared himself for it - went to that bar and recited his poetry for bloody sake, thinking this would be it. He wasn't supposed to be here, and not just in the Sunnydale sense. He wasn't supposed to be here, at all. And how was he going to explain that to her, explain any of it to her? 'Yeah, love - seems I've traveled back in time, about eight or nine months. Illyria, a shelled out she-God version of a bird I once knew named Fred that I can't seem to find around here, popped me back. Was fighting in an alleyway, two minutes after the ex-Love of Your Life had his immortal life cut short - was pretty damn close to dying for the second time in as many years myself until ol' Blue decided to play a nice little game of fuck-all with yours truly. Toss me back in time, muck up the whole life I've built for myself. So, yeah - be a doll and go along with the nice demented vampire.'

She was staring hard at him and he could feel the anger rolling off of her. She was pissed and confused, and hell - so was he! Why is it that he was supposed to explain this to her when he couldn't even explain it to himself? Internal-rant switched back on - why the bloody hell did things like this always happen to him? Illyria couldn't have grabbed a hold of Gunn and let him play out his past again? She couldn't have worked this mojo on the Champ, let _him_ get stuck in some past dimension? Hell, would've worked better that way, seeing as all of this was the Poof's bloody fault to begin with!

A loud and impatient sigh coming from Buffy drew him back out of his thoughts.

Registering the tap of her foot and the twitch in her jaw, he knew he was well on his way to earning a punch in the nose if he didn't quickly start to cooperate. "I can't explain it to you," he finally told her, breathing out his frustration. "I don't even know _how_ to explain it to you."

"Try," she strongly suggested.

He sighed, staring hard at her. Well, if she wanted to be General!Buffy, then he'd tell her what he knew. Cliff Notes version and all, complete with the random thought sequence as he tried to work it all out in his own head. He relented, and immediately started to recollect to the best of his account. "Right, okay. So, five minutes ago I'm fighting with Angel--"

"Angel?" she quickly cut in, and what a surprise at that - interrupting at the name of her One Truly.

"Yeah," he answered thinly, ignoring the pangs of guilt that came with being jealous over Angel, remembering that where he last was the Poof was a thin coat of dust on a wet alley ground. He ducked his head down, playing things over in his mind. Deciding for a different tactic than his current one of choice, his head snapped back upwards. "No, wait. That's a bad start... So Illyria grabbed on to me, right? Took hold of my arm and white-flashed me here."

"Illyria?"

"She-God," he clarified quickly. "Blue-- She's an Older One, from the Deeper Wells. She has this thing that she does, where she can travel through dimensions, travel back in time and what-have-you. She's not even supposed to be able to... Wes was supposed to... But she did it, popped me a good few months back, and I don't know how, or why." He paused, searching her confused eyes. "You following?"

She shook her head. "Not at all, but keep going."

"I think that's what she did, Buffy - sent me back in time." Off her look of doubt, he added defensively, "Look, I know it doesn't make sense to you, but this isn't real for me. Being here, right now, in Sunnydale with you. Well," he conceded with a snort. "It's real, but it's... different. It's the past, I think."

Buffy blinked. "The _past_?"

"Look at me," he told her, trying desperately to convince her. "I'm wet, I'm covered in blood, most of which isn't even mine. I'm bruised, I'm tired--"

"I know," she said, taking a step towards him. "I don't know _why_."

"I _told you _- Illyria worked her mojo and flashed me back here, back in time. Where I was five minutes ago, where I belong, is Los Angeles."

Buffy looked incredulously at him, and while parts of him entirely understood that look,the more frustrated parts wanted to shake some sodding sense into her, maybe get her to have a little faith in him for once. "So. You're saying that you _traveled_ back in time?"

He let out a slow breath, nodding his head. "Yeah," he answered, pulling her by the arm and walking them over to a near-by bench. Exhaustion was wearing him out, and if he was going to be getting into a lengthy descriptive discussion with the Slayer, he'd rather be comfortable.

They both sat down slowly, Buffy's face blank while he continued to stare expectantly at her, waiting for more of a response.

"You're from the future," she eventually went on, face drawn together in deep thought. "And where you were five minutes ago was in LA?"

"Yeah," he breathed out, relieved at the acceptance in her voice. "You believe me?"

"I don't know," she answered quickly, unsure.

"You _don't_ believe me?"

"I don't know! What do you want me to say, Spike? One minute we're patrolling, you by my side. The next thing I know you're behind me, wet and hurt, and I don't know! It doesn't make any sense."

"I _know_ it doesn't, Buffy. I warned you it wouldn't, but it's the truth."

She shook her head disbelievingly, and abruptly discontinued the conversation as she rushed to stand up. "Giles is waiting, and the Potentials," she said, backing away. "We should probably get back before they send out a search party."

Spike sat stunned. "Buffy--"

"Spike, whatever you're talking about, whatever's wrong... We'll fix it, okay?"

Slowly, he began to stand up next to her, feeling the pain in a whole new light as his body protested his movement. "You believe me, then?"

"I don't know," she softly answered, staring at him. Another few seconds of silence fell between them as she searched his eyes, but whatever it was she saw, or didn't see in them, had her turning on her heels and walking off. And he was right behind her, following her back to a house he thought he'd never see again.


	3. Stories and Alibies

_"Blue was gonna pop me in to see her, ya know."_

_Angel's eyebrows twitched upwards at Spike's casual out-of-nowhere comment. Slowly, he pulled away from the small bottle of alcohol he was holding loosely between two of his fingers. He'd been staring at the thing intently for the past twenty minutes, deep in thought, until he heard Spike. Knitting his brow in confusion, he looked over at him from the opposite side of the small jet. "What?"_

_Spike sat up from his reclined position, reaching across the aisle to snatch one of those travel-sized bottles of JD from the Champ's assorted collection of liquor. "Illyria," he answered, leaning comfortably back into his seat with the newly acquired bottle in hand, "offered to take me to see Buffy once." _

_He tilted his head back against the chair, propping his feet up on the empty seat in front of him while he twisted the cap off, bringing the small bottle up to his face. He stared at it a bit disappointedly, squinting his eyes as he strained to read the small print on the back label. The things were a bloody joke, a tease. Vampire's constitution or not, there was no way anyone could get decently sloshed off them. Unless you were a real tiny bloke, miniature sized and all - or already so pissed you'd just be adding small drops of fuel to the already burning fire. With one last wistful look, he sighed, and swallowed the contents in one shot._

_It was all kinda pointless - him and the Champ sitting there, getting far from drunk as they downed tiny bottle after even tinier bottle. The alcohol didn't hold, but at least the warmth as it slid down his throat and into his chest felt satisfyingly good. At least it provided a temporary buzz to numb the Buffy-shaped pain he'd felt since him and Angel dragged themselves from Buffy's apartment the last time, to the comfort of their necro-tempered jet._

_And - 'Buffy-shaped pain'? Bloody hell, he was starting to talk like her._

_Scoobyims aside, it wasn't all bad sitting there, drinking in a mutual sort of silence. There was an unspoken understanding between the two; commiseration by way of shared sympathy for the other. Both having been replaced in Buffy's life by someone who called himself "The Immortal", and hey, big surprise - the ponce_was_ immortal. Points for ingenuity. The drinking _did _lead to a pretty impressive collection of empty bottles, though. If you stacked them up real high, pushed them all close together-like, and squinted your eyes hard enough - you'd probably have the makings of a regular-sized bottle of Jack Daniels._

_Spike sighed, reaching across the plane to add to their empty bottle collection and grab himself a new one. Pushing back into his seat, he caught a glimpse of Angel staring expectantly at him. "What?" he asked, frowning as he twisted off cap number... hell if he knew. Somewhere between two and fifteen. He'd lost count, with the thinking and what-all._

_Angel brought his empty hand to his face, scratching his chin slowly, blinking a few times. "You said something about Illyria, and Buffy."_

_"Oh, right." He dropped his feet from the seat, sitting up again. Angel leaned back into his own chair, staring skeptically at Spike, and finally put down the half-empty bottle so that he could properly fold his hands across his chest, patented brood in place. "You know that time-jumping thing she was using before Wes zapped it out of her?" Spike continued. "That."_

_Angel's brow furrowed even more, his face a mask of confusion as he mulled things over. "She was gonna jump you through time to see Buffy?" he asked after a few seconds._

_"Was, yeah," Spike answered casually._

_"Why?"_

_He laughed lightly, leaning back in the seat again as his hands folded behind his head. "Wanted another fanboy, I s'pose. She told me that we 'killed her Qwa'ha' Zan', like I'm supposed to what, care? I couldn't give a piss about that wanker. Got what he deserved, or... less than what he deserved, actually. If it were me, I'd have--"_

_"What does that have to do with Buffy?"_

_Spike shrugged. "Guess it was supposed to be like a trade. I get to see Buffy, she gets her fanboy."_

_Angel straightened, suddenly looking a bit less stoic. "And did you? Trade?"_

_"Yeah, I did," Spike replied sarcastically, his hands loosening from behind his head as he sat up. "Every day I'd meet up with Illyria and she'd mojo me to Buffy. We'd shag like monkeys for hours 'til I had to bugger off. Got popped back just in time to make the daily 5 o'clock meetings, you lot none-the-wiser. And this here, this trip to Rome? Just part of our big cover-up, with The Immortal and all. Didn't want you to get too curious."_

_"Okay, stupid question," he admitted, falling back into the curve of his seat. "It's just... why didn't you?" he asked hesitantly._

_Spike shook his head at that, genuinely unsure. "Don't know, I guess. I didn't really think about it at the time, was more focused on the being subjected to an ass kicking more brutal than the Slayer's. Less enjoyable, too."_

_"You know, I'm kinda surprised..."_

_Spike scoffed, his whole body tensing at Angel's words. Figures he'd be accused of something like treachery. "Surprised that, what? I didn't immediately jump at her offer?" he asked incredulously, snorting out his disbelief. "I didn't immediately betray you all, just so I could be with Buffy? Cause -- 'poor ol' Spike, so hung up on Buffy', right?"_

_Angel frowned, and shifted in chair some. "I was going to say something more along the lines of being surprised that she even offered you something like that... But, yeah,I guess I am a little surprised you didn't take her up on it."_

_He relaxed, sinking back into the chair. Thought about what Angel said a few seconds before shrugging again nonchalantly. "Believe me, afterwards? I thought about it. Dreamt about it. Seriously considered going to her and taking her up on it, bugger the consequences. In the end, though, I couldn't. I mean, even if I knew what the hell Blue meant by it in the first place, I still don't think I would have."_

_A comfortable silence fell between them, and Angel turned away to look straight ahead out the small plane window. Spike held the still full bottle in his hands, rocking it back and forth between his fingers, watching as the alcohol swished slowly against its sides. Truth was, he hadn't really registered Illyria's offer when it was first being given. His head was a bit sore from being sandwiched in between her Highness' foot and the training room floor - deep thought wasn't exactly an ability at the time. Not that coherent thoughts would've helped him suss out her offer, anyway. In the days afterwards, he'd thought about it. Wondered just what the hell she'd meant by it. If Spike would've agreed, then she'd have, what? Gone to him, have him click his heels a few times, and - no longer in Kansas anymore? Perform some spell of sort? Create some whirly vortex that sucked him through time? Create another dimension entirely?_

_For the most part, it didn't really trickle into place in his mind until after they had zappedher powerout of her. After Angel had told them all what had happened with him. How he'd jumped through dimensions with her, went back in time, played things through a second time and had the chance to fix things. Then it all clicked into place, then the weight of it hit him. And he'd thought about it then, what Illyria had meant and what she'd offered. What he'd given up. To go see Buffy. For just the one time, for forever. For a day, an hour._

_But he wouldn't have done it, even if it would've been a 'no strings attached' sort of thing._

_"Besides,"Spike finally said, picking up like there wasn't that long bit of silence in between. "'I'm nobody's bitch but love's." He smiled at his own words, raising an eyebrow in amusement, before tossing his head back and swallowing the alcohol. Fingering the empty bottle, he laughed lightly, looking over at Angel as a new thought took over. "It's too bad Blue still didn't have that mojo. We could've gone back and stopped The Immortal. End his game before it even started."_

_"Yeah..." Angel slowly started to smile and sat up in his chair, immediately interested. "Before Darla--"_

_"Before Drusilla."_

_"Show up out of nowhere, when he least expects it, weapons in hand..." Angel's face fell disappointedly. "Except he's _immortal

_Spike shrugged, snorting out dismissively. "So? We could still hurt him. And it'd be kinda hard to make off with our women if he didn't have a head."_

_"Or limbs and... appendages," Angel grinned._

_"Sword would probably be effective," Spike agreed, nodding his head thoughtfully. "Painful, too."_

_"Or there's the bottom of the sea. We could lock him in a box and drop him in the middle of the ocean, let him spend the rest of forever down there." Spike had absolutely no idea what the Champ was going on about, so Angel clarified. "It was a whole... thing. With Connor. He felt bad about it later."_

_"Right," Spike said, deciding he'd rather not know. He leaned back in his chair, sighing heavily, depressed at the reality that it was all talk. Buffy really was with The Immortal, and there wasn't a thing either of them could do about it. His head was spinning with 'what-if's', the big and more recurring one being that maybe if he'd have hopped on a plane like he'd originally planned to do when he first got corporeal, maybe they would've... or maybe, at least_she_ wouldn't have..._

_And instead he was sitting here with Captain Broods-About-It, frighteningly on the brink of brooding himself, tiny empty bottle of liquor in his hand, and heading back to LA without having received so much as a 'hello' from Buffy. Without even getting to talk to her or see her. All that way, and for nothing. For a flash of blond hair._

_He snorted, resisting the urge to laugh at the patheticness of it all. "It's too bad we zapped it out of her, then."_

_"Yeah," Angel agreed quietly, picking up his small bottle of liquor again._

_Spike inhaled deeply. "Yep," he breathed back out. _

_--------------------------------------------------------------------------_

"Right, so I'm taking the Miss Teenies out, is that it?" Faith asked, staring back and forth between Buffy and Spike, waiting for a confirmation.

"Yeah," Buffy answered, and stepped out of the way as the group of Potentials poured out of the kitchen and made their way to the front door. "Just for a little bit," she added, briefly catching Spike's gaze before focusing back on Faith. "There's something we have to deal with without, you know,distractions."

"Okay, yeah," Faith agreed, nodding her head understandingly. She smiled, gesturing towards the group of Scoobies assembled in the living room. "Don't think I don't know what this is about, though. Hey, if Andrew mentions something about a Hot Pocket, just know that I never saw any of those so-called post-it notes of claim on it. I mean, you know how it is - you do the whole slaying thing, you work up an appetite... unfortunately, I had to settle for food and that Hot Pocket was about the only appetizing thing in the house, save Blondie here." She nudged her head towards Spike, shooting him a conspirative sort of glance.

Spike's eyebrows immediately shot up at the attention... and then guiltily fell back down at the look Buffy was giving him. Were he not jet-lagged from the time warp of hell and currently in a bruised and bloodied state of exhaustion, he might've wondered what the hell that was all about. The wink-wink look Faith gave him, the jealous sort of look Buffy shot him. The jealous look Buffy was _still_ giving him...

Andrew pushed his way through the group of girls, his arms flung across his chest in an all-too-familiar pout. "I hope this assemblage is about a certain Hot Pocket _incident_," he hinted, tossing a heated glare over at Faith.

"Hey, calm down, Murder, He Wrote. It ain't about that." Faith defensively folded her own arms across her chest and threw a look towards Buffy. "At least that's not what B says. And besides, give up the whole Hot Pocket ordeal - it happened. Here, I've got two bucks... we'll go to a store, I'll go all out and buy you a new pack - overly-dramatized problem _solved_."

Andrew's face scrunched up even further into a pout. "That's so totally not even the issue here. It's about respect, and... and consideration! I've been here a lot longer than you have, and am substantially less evil." He smiled sweetly at Buffy before glaring back at Faith. "And - those were only out for a limited time! I doubt they even have the same flavor... with its wonderfully refreshing and surprisingly crisp breading..._especially_ with the store not being freshly stocked due to certain 'Apocalypses'," he air-quoted.

Spike was growing continuingly more annoyed and the boy and his whinging wasn't doing anything to ease it. He shot Buffy a pointed look, letting her know without words that if he had to spend another two seconds listening to Andrew, all the little girlies fluttering around them would get their own up close and personal show of how exactly a vampire kills annoying little gits. She knew exactly what the look meant, and offered a sympathetic smile.

Without waiting for so much as another glance, Spike stepped into the living room where there was the group of waiting Scoobies. Xander, Anya, and Dawn were all huddled closely together on the couch, watching the ensuing argument between Buffy and Andrew. Willow sat in an armchair off to the side, and Giles had propped himself up against the farthest wall, keeping a watchful eye as well. Minus the pun.

Spike sighed as he realized that their was a predictable lack of chairs for him and the Slayer, and had to settle for standing. Which brought on a feeling of awkwardness, as he had no idea where to go or what to prop his tired body against. The entire right side of the room was filled with Scoobies, and a good most of them were fitting him with glares of sorts. Reluctantly, he decided to just hang where he was - off to the side of the room, leaning against the wood framing of the room entrance. Got himself comfortable, and allowed his gaze to linger back to Buffy.

The trip back to her house had been awkward, to spin it in a completely understated way. He'd kept his distance from her, staying a few steps behind as she walked silently ahead. She'd turn around every so often to stare at him, asked him a time or few if he was okay, her eyes lingering over his chest and staring at his torn t-shirt. He could see the confusion still in her face, the way she looked at him. Could still feel the tension and hesitance in her body. He'd nod a response, mutter a 'Yeah'. She'd turn back around, resume the quiet lead.

It was a whole different feeling walking through his old graveyard, through the streets of Sunnydale, knowing that the place didn't exist anymore. Knowing that it was supposed to be rubble, that the buildings weren't supposed to be there. He took it all in with a sense of familiarity, feeling oddly nostalgic about it. He'd been suppressing all thoughts of Sunnydale the past year, mentally locking them away for occasions that only heavy amounts of alcohol could bring out. No use in getting all pathetic over something that was gone, anyway. But he was there, and it was there, and _they_ were there - and it was awkward. Awkward, a bloody obvious thing to think. Awkward and surreal, and terrifying all on its own. It dredged up old memories, old feelings, old insecurities - all those ponce-like feelings he'd happily dropped during all that time in Los Angeles.

Everything looked so _normal_. So... familiar. The crypt, the path from his graveyard to her house. The one he could've been blind and still been able to follow, having crossed it so many times before. The way she walked in front of him, head held high despite the loud, erratic beat of her heart that had pounded loudly in his own ears. And him at her heels, following along, generally being ignored.

It felt like old times. Exactly like old times.

Watching her from the doorframe now, he was half-aware of the Scoobies watching as well. Which brought about another sort of 'surreal' feeling - being there, with them. He hadn't seen any of them since that last day in Sunnydale. Hadn't exactly thought about any of them in all the time that had passed, either. And yet, there he was. With them. Again. The Whelp sitting next to his girl. Willow observing things quietly. Dawn disappearing into the couch cushions. Rupert and the bloody annoying glares that he kept tossing at Spike. Was like old times, exactly. Like he was living a day out of his past over again.

Which, he mentally corrected, he_was_, given Blue's decision to royally muck up his life.

He was in the past. The bloody fucking past. The Powers That Be better have some pretty big reward waiting for him when all was said and done with, because this was bordering on levels of atonement that erased his entire past completely.

How much does one bloke have to do in the sake of reformation, anyway? Angel - he tried to send the world to Hell, and what'd he get out of it? A sodding trip to a Hell dimension. It's like one of those 'eye for an eye' punishments, and where's the justice in that? Especially considering the rectangular block of brood got dropped back into existence all of a hundred years of torture later. The Powers couldn't have their precious Angel out of the picture for too long, so he gets to come back, and for what? The Hero of the People role he picked up for the whole three years before dropping and abandoning it completely in switch of swanky offices, shiny cars, and an updated lifestyle?

Be the bloke that travels half-way around the world to earn your soul in trial after painful trial, and want to know what your great reward is?

Brain-fucks by incorporeal Firsts!

That's right - shove your soul back into place, get it zapped back into you in the least climactic way possible by some over-sized action figure, and congratu-fucking-lations: you've now earned a bloody month long trip into madness! And then, when that bit of fun wears off, when you finally get a good stable thing going - death for you! And the death was okay, even. The death was exactly how you wanted it. It was you going out in a fit of blazing glory. The last image you saw was your girl running away safely, the last words you heard were exactly what you'd been longing to hear since before you'd nancied yourself up with a soul to begin with.

Couldn't end with that, though, not when there's that small print you missed out on - the disclaimer you'd missed on the back of that pretty little amulet you wore to save the world. You know, the one that read: "Congratulations, mate - you're screwed!" Prepare to be popped back into existence as your considerably dusty bits and pieces get painfully brought back to unlife. And when that's over with, when your experimental resurrection is done with, and yep - more painful coming back then it was going out - get tossed and yanked around for a few months in an ironic state of ghostliness. You're confined to an evil law firm run by the CEO of wankers himself - your not-so-favorite grandsire Angel. And _just_ when you'd gone and come to a peaceful sort of acceptance with _that_ brand new lifestyle, _just_ when you're ready to throw it all away again in the sake of bloody doing the right thing - you get this! Thrown into the past in a blink and flash of white sodding light.

And guess what, ladies and gents - unless the Scooby Gang can work their own sort of blinding light mojo and flash you_back_ to your latest heroic death scene - you get to relive death number two _all over again!_

With a deep sigh, Spike pushed himself out of his thoughts, growing increasingly annoyed and them doing nothing but add onto it. The Watcher kept staring at him, tossing him those wary glares, and looking entirely disgusted that Spike dare share the same room as him. The heartbeats of every single person in the house - the whole small army of them - were sounding off in his head, doing nothing to ease his anxiousness, instead adding another fun layer to it as it sung out to the demon within, calling forth a mental reminder that he was a vampire with a bloodlust that hadn't been properly satiated in years.

He shoved all that away, and focused instead on Buffy, calming effect that she was. Watched as she reassured Faith once again that their improvised meeting had nothing to do with Hot Pockets, and then as she quieted Andrew when he whinged some more about the lack of respect he had in their "House of Reformative Evil". At that, the Slayer let out her own frustrated sigh and forcefully pulled open the front door. She stood in silence and watched as all the Potentials understood her unspoken demand and quietly filed out.

"Right," Faith said with a small smile. "Later, then." She was half-way out the door before she stopped, frowning just a little. "Wait. We're still on for tonight, right?"

"Right," Buffy confirmed.

"Okay, so we'll make this a nice, short trip. Be back soon?" Off Buffy's nod, she smiled, turned around, and walked out.

"Andrew." Buffy fixed him with a deadly stare, pointing towards the open front door. "Go."

"Go?" he asked meekly, swallowing hard. "Go where?"

"With Faith. Now." She didn't wait for a response, just grabbed the boy by the arm and pushed him out the door, closing it solidly behind her despite the quiet protests he'd stuttered out. Walking into the living room, Buffy took her position right next to Spike. Immediately she went into a defensive stance, folding her hands across her chest as she looked around the room. Spike followed in suite, turning around and facing the Scoobies as all eyes in the room focused on the two of them.

"Okay," Xander spoke up, after a stretched moment of silence. "So we're all converged here, why? We've already confirmed it's not about the Hot Pocket incident, which I'm having to side with Faith on, by the way. There's not a new evil out there looking to add to the list, is there?" he asked hopefully. "Please tell me there's no new evil."

Everybody turned to look at Buffy and Spike. Spike could feel the tension in the room again, could sense the distrust still coming from Giles as he stared with a look of unmasked disapproval at the sight of him and Buffy standing side by side - which was distracting and continuingly annoying.

"No," Buffy assured softly, warily. "No new evil."

"So, what is it then?" Xander asked again, this time with a frown. "And... am I the only noticing the fact that Spike here is wet and bloody?"

Giles cleared his throat. "Yes, Buffy," he said, bringing attention to himself. "Was there an attack? Was this..."

"No," she answered quickly, her eyes catching Spike's for the shortest of seconds before she shook her head, her attention going back to her Watcher. "It wasn't him. I don't think he's stupid enough to try something like that again."

There was another awkward silence as Buffy continued to stare at her Watcher. Giles looked slightly embarrassed and a bit uncomfortable as he nodded, backing up against the wall again. Spike watched the two of them with growing interest. He couldn't for the unlife of him figure out what Buffy was talking about. He was too tired to thoroughly wrack his brain for any sort of remembrance on why Buffy and her Watcher were teetering around each other, and still didn't get why there was all that tension Giles was throwing Spike's way. Well, aside from Rupert's general aversion for Spike, that is.

Buffy turned towards him, looking at him pointedly.

"Right," he said, realizing that was his cue. He took a deep breath, stepping forward to grab everybody's attention. Breathing it out heavily, he told them, "Long story short--"

"He's from the future."

Spike turned back towards Buffy, and she shot him an apologetic look. "Was gonna open with something a little less direct," he said, pausing. "But that works, too."

There was another brief moment of silence as all eyes focused on Spike, the sound of the room uncomfortably silent.

"Wait, I'm sorry," Xander finally chuckled, scooting to the edge of the couch. He dipped his head downwards, staring at Buffy. "I thought you just said 'Spike's from the future', and _obviously_ that's not so, as that's crazy Andrew talk."

"Nope, that's what she said," Anya supplied helpfully, with a reassuring pat on his knee. "Spike here is apparently from the future."

"Great." He flashed a patronizing smile at Anya, before focusing again on Buffy. "So, the next logical thought process is: huh?"

Spike turned to Buffy, figuring for some reason it'd sound more believable coming out of her mouth - probably in light of the fact that they trusted her entirely, where as they trusted him... not at all, come to think of it.

Buffy shrugged indifferently. "We were patrolling. One minute: sane Spike, next minute: wet-bloody-and apparently delusional Spike."

"Hey," Spike cut in, semi-offended. "We're going for a more convincing slant, Slayer."

Xander narrowed his eyes, looking Spike up and down. "Okay, seeing the wet and bloody, as previously noted," he said, nodding and squinting his eyes in appraisal. "Feeling you with the delusional, wasn't quite ever with you on the sane - but I'm still big with the 'huh?'"

"He keeps talking about someone named Blue, or Illyria," she continued, shrugging her shoulders slightly, in a way that was steadily getting on Spike's nerves. The Slayer and her bloody ability to disassociate herself from the situation entirely.

"You're saying that without any sort of conviction behind it," Spike told her, not bothering to hold back on the amount of exasperation slipping into his tone. "I'm not just 'talking' about her, I'm _telling_ you about her."

"You said... Illyria?" Giles picked up on. His brow drew together, and he looked at Spike. "That sounds... _vaguely_ familiar."

"I figured if there was one of you who'd know who I was talking about, it'd be you. Illyria's an Older One," Spike started to explain, off the collective blank looks. "Came from some hole in the world called the Deeper Wells, as I'm sure you've heard of," he added, with a glance towards Giles. "Has all sorts of power, too. Strength that rivals that of yours truly, the ability to pause time to a bloody stand still, and painfully so. Moves as fast as anything I've seen, except when she's doing that time mojo. Real nice mix of defenses, the ability to go back in time, jump--"

"Jump dimensions," Giles finished for him, a bit knowingly.

"Right," Spike nodded.

"And so you're saying - _Illyria_ - sent you back in time?" Giles asked, the skepticism thick in his voice.

"Yeah. She popped me back before I knew what it was she was doing. One minute we're standing in the middle of LA, death and mayhem and your varying amount of carnage, and the next I know there's nothing but white and the wind beneath my wings - and then I'm in Sunnydale. Except Sunnydale a year back."

"Which is where I'm lost," Buffy inserted.

"Really?" Xander piped up, a look of disbelief on his face. "_That's_ where you're lost? Because I'm still stuck on 'Spike's from the future'."

"I've heard of, ah, Illyria," Giles slowly told her, the lines of his forehead pushed together thoughtfully. "But only in passing. I've seen the name referenced in books, as a... a myth of sort, or so I believed. An older power, that once existed. I-- I never particularly gave it much attention, honestly, as you would imagine. I _do_ seem to recall there being mention of it as asource of great power, but it was all conveniently vague, and scarcely detailed."

"So... you're saying this Illyria person is real?"

"Uh, technically she's not a person," Spike felt obligated to correct. "She's more of a... God. Like I said, she's an Older One. She who once ruled the world, back in the Land Before Time, before humans, with the servant muck and your basic equivalent of demon minions... and believe me, she'll gladly tell you long, drawn out tales about it--"

"So, she's real, then?" Buffy pressed.

"Real as you and me," he answered thinly.

"Giles?" She looked to him for a confirmation.

"As far as I know," he admitted, albeit a bit hesitantly.

"So this could be true? The whole 'from the future' thing?"

"It _is_ true," Spike insisted. "Wet, bleeding," he reminded her, gesturing down at himself. "Painfully bruised."

"Okay," Xander interrupted, sitting up and calling for a time out. "Pause on the freak show, cut to sanity-inspiring commercials. Just because Marty McFly here comes moseying in with his wet clothes and fancy bruises, and is all, 'Hey guys, me and the Doc come from the future!' - it doesn't mean we're buying it, yeah?" He glanced around the room, looking for an agreement. "We are talking _Spike_ here. Previously known as crazy-in-the-basement!Spike, and most recently as controlled-by-the-First!Spike. I mean, how do we know it's not something The First is doing to mess with us, Buffy?"

"I don't know," Willow spoke up for the first time that night, doubt in her voice. She sat up in the chair, drawing attention to herself. "Why would The First go through all the trouble to do something like this? Usually its one Spike motive is, you know... kill. And it hasn't exactly... _used_ Spike lately. It's kinda been preoccupied with Caleb and the killing of Potentials."

"Yes, true, but did you hear the emphasis I put on 'controlled-by-the-First'?" Xander said, discarding that argument just as quickly as it'd been given. "The First who, let's face it, has a lovely sort of homicidal mind control on Spike. Did we all just forget about that? Trigger? Resulting mass murder? Ringing any bells, or should we set him loose and test this theory?"

Spike shrugged, already having heard all this a year before. "Yeah, about that - I worked out my mum issues."

"Right. And that means what exactly?"

"Means that the First's little brain-fucks don't work on me," he elaborated, breathing out his annoyance. "They haven't worked on me in over a year, which is the point I'm trying to make."

"Okay, now see," Xander said, glancing around the room again. "Stuff like that doesn't make this any more believable."

"Don't really care if you believe me," Spike sighed, frustrated. "I _just_ need the help of Red and Giles, and the rest of you lot can carry on your merry way."

"Me?" Willow asked hesitantly, her eyes widening. "Why me?"

"Magic?" he reminded her. "You can get me back."

"Back to where?" Dawn asked quietly, immediately drawing Spike's attention to her. He hadn't even noticed her in the room, not really. God, he'd missed her, too. Even if that was a one-sided sort of deal.

"Back to LA."

"I'm still..." Buffy spoke up beside him, trailing off as she let out a frustrated breath. "I'm still having trouble wrapping my head around all this."

"Join the team," Xander drawled.

"It's just..." Buffy continued, her gaze tearing away from Spike's as she turned to face the Scoobies. "It doesn't make any sense."

"Sense?" Spike countered, scoffing a little. "Rot. When have things ever made any sense around here?"

"Things like this don't just _happen._ Vampires, apocalypses, invisible girls, little talking puppets - things like that I can handle. Point me in the direction of a prom, let loose some demon dogs, and I'm there. Ready-made with sword in hand and looking to get my Kill Bill on. But... people going back in time?" She shook her head, breathing out her inability to grasp the subject.

"Uh, funny thing you should mention puppets..." Spike started, trailing off at the confused look Buffy gave him. Right. No time to get in his digs at Angel, no matter the instant mental picture of the Poof as a tiny felt puppet her words had caused.

"It's not that unbelievable," Willow quietly announced. Buffy's head lifted upwards, everybody else looking at her expectantly as she continued. "Well, it's just, you know... there's spells that can take people back in time, there're other dimensions."

"I'm surprised we haven't faced something like this as it is," Giles added, his more Watcherly sides interested. "It _is_ rather unique..."

"'Unique' as in 'completely surreal'?" Xander asked in objection. "Because I can second that type of unique."

"Well, I believe you, Spike," Anya offered, smiling at him encouragingly.

Xander's body swiveled towards her in one disbelieving motion. "Wait," he cried out. "You _believe _him?"

"Calm down, Xander, you don't need to yell," she replied, brushing a loose strand of hair back behind her ear as she eyed everyone in the room, all of whom were staring at her.

"You believe him?" he repeated, just as loudly.

"Well he _is_ wet and bleeding."

"So!"

"So?" Anya looked over at Buffy, widening her eyes. "Did you two get attacked just now?"

Buffy's gaze skipped over to Spike's, before going back to Anya's. "No," she admitted.

"Is it raining?"

"Not exactly, but--"

"And you're saying this Illyria thing is real, right?" Anya asked Giles while staring expectantly at him, waiting for the confirmation she knew he'd give her.

"Well, ah, as far as I know... yes."

She looked around the room before directing her attention back to Xander. "So, then - what's not to believe? It's all right here in front of us."

A smirk slowly curled Spike's lips upwards. He knew there was a reason Anya was one of the few members of the Scooby Gang he could actually stand to be around. Her direct sort of approach simplified things up for him, hopefully enough that the others would start to believe, too.

Xander looked at Spike again, shaking his head. "Is this some form of demon solidarity us humans are missing out on?"

"It's called 'gumption', you git," Spike drawled, annoyance creeping into his tone. "What more evidence do you need? A hand-written note from Illyria? Cause, sorry, Blue's decided to pull a Houdini on us."

"Well, isn't that convenient," Xander answered dryly, before looking to Buffy. He lowered his voice a little. "Excuse me for not jumping on the 'I believe, Spike' train. Last time someone told me to put a little faith in the I'm-from-the-future argument, I seem to recall a certain wedding-that-wasn't. Bad, bad, very unpleasant associated memories."

Anya shifted beside him, aware of the memories everyone had about their wedding. "That was different, Xander," she said, keeping her voice intentionally even. "That guy ended up being a demon. It wasn't even real."

Xander snorted. "Yes, thank you, point-maker. How do we know this thing here is Spike, even? Walks like a Spike, talks like a Spike - it doesn't mean it's him."

"No." Buffy shook her head, slow at first and then stronger with conviction. "No, it's him. I know it is."

"And you know this, how? Did he flash you his secret decoder ring? Did you guys plan a fail safe, 'Now this is what to do incase one of us ever gets thrown into the past', and he's uttered the sacred words?"

"I can feel it," she continued undeterred. "Believe me - Slayer here. I know when I'm standing next to a vampire. I know when I'm standing next to _this_ vampire."

Xander breathed in loudly, letting it out just as exaggeratedly. His brow furrowed together as he squinted at Spike. "So..." he started, staring skeptically. "You're from the future, then?"

Spike sighed. "As I've only said numerous times."

"Well, then... who wins the Superbowl!" he shouted, his eyes wide and daring.

Spike huffed. "Like I bloody watch your American sport."

"A'ha!" Xander jumped up from the couch, pointing wildly. "I _knew_ it, Mr. Lies And Then Tries To Kill Us All In Our Sleep, The First's Lackey guy!"

"Uh, I think that just means Spike doesn't watch football," Willow told him softly. She paused, frowning. "_You_ don't watch football."

Xander frowned, looking around at the faces staring at him. With a dejected plop, he fell back onto the couch. "Yeah, so - the key to unveiling all evil doesn't lie in America's favorite holiday," he muttered dejectedly.

Dawn stirred beside him. "Uh, Xander? The Superbowl isn't a holiday."

"Tell that to my Uncle Rory."

"As... _illustrative_ a test as that was," Giles started, throwing an awkwardglance towards Xander. "I believe there might be _some_ means of finding out if what Spike says is, well, the truth."

Spike bit the inside of his cheeks, swallowing down the urge to pound his head against the nearest wall. It was either that or rip the bloody heads off everybody in the room, the Slayer aside. He'd forgotten just how thick these people were. Back in LA, they'd have been on this case in no time. No questions asked beside what was necessary, and the whole arsenal would've been there to help. Wes and his books, researching and cross-referencing and doing that whole Head boy act. Gunn would be searching the files of Wolfram and Hart to see if something like this had been recorded in any of their documents, looking for a solution to get him back. Angel and his protruding brow would be staring sulkily from some shadowed corner of the room, brood firmly intact, useless but there all the same.

Point is - they'd believe him. They'd help him, and he wouldn't have had to sit there for half an hour trying to convince them that he was telling them the truth.

"But how?" Willow was asking, uncertain. "It's not like we can ask him a question like, 'What's the winning lotto-ball numbers?' and know if he's answering right."

That caught Anya's attention. "Winning lotto-ball numbers?" she asked in interest, smiling brightly at Willow. "You mean, the game with large amounts of cash given to one lucky winner over a stretch of many years, or handed to them in one lump sum if the series of random and intricately varying numbers are guessed correctly?"

Willow smiled back slowly. "That would be the one."

Anya's gaze jumped to Spike.

"Don't know a bloody thing about lotto-ball numbers."

Her mouth closed with a disappointed, "Oh."

Xander sat back up again, steering the conversation back to Spike. "So, predictability of Anya and her love for all things money aside - if you're Future Guy, does that mean you can tell us our futures?"

He immediately perked at the idea, a small amount of his annoyance being pushed away. "Not unless you plan on paying me," he answered, with a bit of a smirk. Xander's face dropped as he continued to stare at Spike, all confused and the like. A mental reminder clicked in place, and Spike did the obligatory, 'this is _Xander_ you're talking to' thing, and elaborated with shorter, more Whelp-friendly (read: easier to understand) words. "I'm not about to be exploited. I've seen the infomercials. You want the info, you break out the dosh, and _maybe_ I might start remembering things."

"Spike," Buffy sighed beside him, and that one word... his name from her lips, coming out the way that it did - thick with an annoyed, unvoiced threat - kicked in a sense of comfort within. Ironic as that was.

"Or," Spike conceded, shooting the Slayer a sarcastic smile. "Buffy here uses her womanly charm and guts it out of me."

"What!" she cried out, offended. Her face immediately jumped to life. "There was no... I'm not doing any gutting! I'm just saying, if you know something that'll help us beat the First, I'd..." She glanced briefly across the room, reconsidering. "_We'd_ appreciate it."

"You'd _appreciate_ it?" he shot back incredulously. The Slayer'd appreciate it? Maybe he didn't get thrown back in time, maybe he got thrown back to another dimension entirely. One with a nice Buffy. "You do know it's_me_ you're talking to, right? I'm still the same, Slayer."

"I know," she told him carefully.

"Ohh right - which is why you're two seconds short of getting your 'please' and 'thank-you''s on, like, what? You're suddenly overcome with manners? Bein' all nice to the Big Bad now?"

"I... it's just..." She was flustered, scraping for an answer. Spike couldn't help but smile at that - it was so bloody familiar. Cute, too. She caught his smile and her eyes instantly hardened as those lips of hers drew thin. "Would you like to revert to our previous ways, then?" She leaned in daringly, eyes holding all sorts of promises of an impending ass kicking. "I can beat the information out of you, if you want."

Spike just chuckled. "Promises, promises."

"Uhh, pissing off a stressed out Slayer?" Xander inserted helpfully. "That's not really the greatest or sanest of ideas." He paused, tilting his head in consideration. "Wait a minute... You sure you're not Spike From The Past? Because he _did_ do that a lot, so I vaguely remember."

"You do seem a bit... different," Giles agreed.

"Yeah, well - you close a Hellmouth and get bound to the likes of our favorite forehead in a state of incorporeal torture for a few months," he replied sarcastically. "You harden on the inside."

Giles frowned. "'Close a Hellmouth'?"

"Yeah," Spike answered, suddenly looking for some compensation. "And where's my gratitude for that? Granted it hasn't happened yet, but you'd think the future lot of you could've at least sent a thank you card or something-- A decorative fruit basket. I _know_ some of you had to have known I was back, there's no way the boy could've kept his mouth shut for so long."

There was another brief awkward silence that fell upon the room.

"Lost completely?" Xander finally asked.

"Completely," Willow agreed.

"I'm picking up on a few choice words here," Buffy said, bringing the attention back over to her and Spike. "Incorporeal? Bound?"

Xander stirred. "Can I just interrupt and ask: what's the deal with Los Angeles? Because it keeps coming up. Do we... are we all going to LA after this thing with the First?"

"Right," Spike said, frowning. "Not exactly."

"So _some_ of us go to LA?" Off the continued look of blankness from Spike, Xander added, "Just you go to LA?"

"'Go to LA' in the sense of having no choice in the matter," Spike replied. "Yeah."

"And this is me inserting another 'huh?' here." He looked over at Buffy. "Los Angeles. That's where-- isn't that where Angel is, all... Crime and Detective?"

Spike scoffed. "I've mentioned the poster boy for hair gel _ho_w many times, and you're just now picking up on it?"

"Well, yeah!" he huffed out defensively. "My brain was stuck on a 'Spike is from the future?' mind loop. For a while there, it was all - rinse, cycle, repeat."

"I could dignify that with a witty response."

"No need," Xander quickly insisted. "So... LA?"

"For the hundredth bleeding time, _yes,_Los Angeles."

"Right, right. And... this was with Angel, yeah?"

Spike inhaled sharply, letting it out in a slow, calming breath. When the red had faded behind his eyes and he was sure he'd controlled the frustration within to the point where he no longer felt the need to beat the stupid and redundancy out of the bloody Whelp, he flatly answered, "Yes. With Angel. In Los Angeles."

"Great googly moogly." Xander's eyes widened. "That can't be good. It's got to be like a Dynamic Duo of Super Tension."

"Super tension?"

"Yeah, what with the two souled vampires all fighting for dominance, both trying to win Buffy's heart."

Spike tensed, staring intently at people other than the little blonde Slayer at his side. "There's no fighting over Buffy," he told him evenly-- told the entire room, matter of fact. Best to get that bit of information out of there, so as to honor up his intentions. He purposely shoved away any and all thoughts of days in LA spent arguing with Angel over Buffy. Unimportant, completely irrelevant sort of thoughts, like... an impromptu sort of trip to Rome, a battle of fists and fangs over a jewel-clad Cup of Mountain Dew, barbs thrown back and forth, that one time he'd beat the Champ in Donkey Kong in the triumphant sake of his and Buffy's more meaningful relationship...

"What?" Xander continued, gaping and unconvinced. "There's you and Angel together, as in mano-e-mano, vampo-e-vampo, and there's no battle-to-the-dust over the girl you both - and I say this completely for argumentative purposes only - love?"

Spike shot Xander a dry smile. "'Fraid so. Sorry to disappoint, though if you'd like, go ahead and continue with the visuals."

Xander grinned. "Cracks at my manhood aside, I'm liking this." Happy, he looked around the room, nodding his head in approval. "This is nice. So Spike from the future is a less-stalking-Buffy type?"

"No," Spike quickly corrected, aware of the awkwardness that'd settled with the mention of his feelings for the Slayer. "Spike from the future is a more realistic type."

"Well I say good," Dawn spoke up, heads swiveling in her direction. She straightened at the attention, her eyes locking with Spike.

"You're damn right it's good," Xander agreed, tossing a glance in Buffy and Spike's direction for emphasis. He stopped, mid-glare, looking back at Dawn like an actual agreement was the last thing he expected. "Wait, what?"

"I'm just saying," Dawn continued, eyes still locked with Spike's. Her tone was entirely emotionless, as was the cold glare she'd fixed him with. "It's good that Spike finally realized Buffy would never love him."

That was a good cause for another dose of awkwardness, as all heads turned from Dawn's icy stare, to Buffy and Spike. Even Xander quieted from the tone of her voice.

Never one to be lost, Anya perked up, looking for clarification. "You mean - because Buffy will never love him like she loved Angel, right?"

"No," Dawn said, her gaze finally going to Buffy's. Slowly, and if possible, hardening even further. "I meant exactly what I said."

"Dawn," Buffy warned, her lips pursed thin. Embarrassed at being called out in front of her friends, no doubt.

"No," Spike cut her off, shaking his head, surprising the room with the intensity of the one word. "It's okay. It's not like what she's saying isn't true, is it? It's not like I haven't leapt to that stunning revelation all on my own."

"Okay, I'm getting it," Xander broke in with a slow-forming smile, nodding in understanding, as if a light had finally been clicked on in his head. "There is no way this is our Spike. Our Spike is all broody--"

"Hang on. I don't brood--"

"--and big with the 'unrequited love-slash-stalker' role. There is_no_ way this is him. This one here's less... oh-my-bloody-obsessive-love-for-the-Slayer," he mocked in a bad English accent, one that instantly made both Giles and Spike cringe. "I like, I _like_. Time has done you good, man."

Buffy stepped forward. "Right, Spike of the future. Best friend of Angel and no longer in love with me, we got it," she breathed out airily.

"Didn't say that," Spike immediately objected, staring at her with an amused look. "I'm not 'best friends' with that bloody poof. We're..." He trailed off, waving his hand in front of him dismissively as he tried to come up with the right word to describe their sort-of relationship. "Colleagues," he finally settled on. "Or, wait - I take that back, because to be a colleague I'd have had to actually have been paid. Never did get a thing in terms of dosh from him, which - knowing the Poof for a century plus - is typical, to say the least."

"You worked with Angel, you say?" Giles piped up, sounding slightly interested. "And this was at that Angel Investigations of his?"

Spike snorted, amused. "Uh, bit more farther up in the scales of life, Rupes. Or, lower, I guess... Wolfram and Hart. Angel was the--"

"Wolfram and Hart?" Giles interrupted, his mouth pressed into a frown. "Angel is associated with Wolfram and Hart? That... _place_ represents all that is evil in this world. I mean, quite literally represents Evil. It's a law firm, I believe."

"Yeah,_was_," Spike agreed, before continuing. "Or, still is. But with Angel there running it, with Wes and Fred--"

"Wes?" Xander cut him off in recognition of the name. He stared blankly back and forth between Spike and Giles.

Spike sighed out in frustration. "Yeah, Wes."

"Wesley Wyndam-Pryce?" This time it was Giles asking.

"No, the other Wes you bloody lot know," Spike barked back sarcastically, annoyance kicked in full time.

Xander's eyes narrowed as he bent forward, confused. "Another Wes? We know another Wes? Since when, 'cause I'm wracking my brain and I'm just coming up with Watcher Guy, who_really_ took that role a bit literally, and-- _okay_, listen to the whistles going off in my head at the realization that that was sarcasm." With an embarrassed smile, he leaned back into the couch, burying himself in the cushions. "Slinking back in embarrassment now."

"Look, it doesn't matter," Spike continued, not bothering to pay any bit of attention to Xander. "None of that matters anymore."

Buffy turned to him, folding her hands across her chest. Patented Slayer stance, so he recognized. "And what matters, then?" she asked tensely.

His mind screamed 'trap!' Told him that that was a loaded question and no matter how he answered it, her reaction wasn't going to be anywhere near pleasant. Logic and survival instincts lost out, as his mouth didn't particularly give a piss. "What _matters_ is LA," he answered, staring intently at her. "What matters is getting back to where I'm wanted, where I'm needed," he added.

Buffy's hands fell down to her sides. "You're needed here," she offered quietly.

He laughed, frustrated, and ducked his head. "Right. Because of the amulet. Sodding obligations."

That brought back the Slayer. "What amulet?" she demanded.

"Right," Spike said, looking around. "Cause the great brooding one hasn't graced us with his presence yet," he reminded himself out loud, really noticing for the first time that Xander didn't have the eye patch. The timeline started to kick in internally then. Faith was here, but Xander still had his eye. And Giles and Buffy with the tension probably had to do with that Principal. Right, which meant the Champ hadn't come and had his snog-and-run yet. He turned back to Buffy with a sigh. "No Pretty McPendant drop-off yet. Obviously."

"There are so many things wrong with that sentence," Xander said, sounding dazed. "Who's 'pretty mcpendant', and what's with the..." He waved his hand in the air, scrunching his face up, "choice of word usage?"

"Not who - what," Spike corrected.

Xander nodded his head up and down understandingly. "Ohhh, right. Cause of the..." He stopped nodding, and started shaking his head. "I got nothing. What is it?"

Spike sighed, more than his fair share of fed up. What started out as a simple thing, pointing out the fact that he didn't belong here, had turned into a game of Twenty Questions, and, personally? He was tired of it. He just wanted to get to the game plan part of the required conversation, and start working on a way to get back. "The pendant," he replied thinly, "Is what Buffy's ex-Truly flounces back into town with, on the very eve of the apocalypse itself. It's also what closes the Hellmouth," he added, waiting knowingly for the flood of questions he'd be getting.

After the obligatory few seconds of silence, Giles leant forward, his eyebrows drawn together, and looked towards Spike with a combined look of interest and skepticism. "You say a - pendant - closes the Hellmouth?"

"Yep," Spike replied flatly. "Given to us by Evil Empire LA themselves."

"Uh, Evil Empire--"

"Wolfram and Hart."

"Right... Wolfram and Hart. And we have reason to believe this, why?"

"Aside from the fact that I was the bloke who wore it, who burned up in a heroic-death and then spent the next few months being confined to the place because of it - I'd say your feelings of belief should ring high."

"'Burned up in a heroic-death'?" Buffy asked slowly.

"Caught that, did you?" He sighed. "Doesn't matter, does it? Didn't matter then, doesn't matter now - I'm here, aren't I?"

"Okay, but what exactly does that mean - you burnt up in a heroic-death?"

"Look, can we just get back to the part where Giles here gets out the books, Red starts getting her magic ready, and we all huddle around and start working on a solution to popping me back?"

"I..." Willow started, but stopped, turning her worried face towards Buffy. "I don't even know if it's possible," she confessed. "I don't know how we would even go about it, where to start, or where to look. I mean, it's unprecedented Scooby stuff--"

"Boldly going where no Scooby has gone before," Xander recited. Off the resulting silence and blank looks, he muttered a, "Sorry."

"What I don't get though, is - what happened to _our_ Spike?" Willow continued unfazed, staring at Buffy interestedly. "It's like some time paradox. Like this Spike here has completely taken over for him."

"Unless we have another bleach haired vamp walking around the streets of Sunnydale," Xander threw out there.

"So, what're you saying then?" Spike asked, growing tense. "If I'm here, the Spike who belongs in this time is, what?"

"There," she answered simply.

"So... if one were then to enlighten you to the fact that 'there' was 'about two seconds from death'... in the helpful scheme of things, that would mean?"

"Uhm..." Willow shifted in her chair uncomfortably, frowning as she looked over at Giles for confirmation. "Not good?"


	4. Alternatives

_AN: Eeep. So I completely forgot about posting my updates here. Sorry about that. Thanks to **Caslia** for the review that served as a reminder :D_

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Spike sat on the top step of Buffy's back porch, staring at a backyard that didn't exist anymore. Staring at a backyard that wouldn't exist anymore, at least. Memories all around it. In the bushes where he'd watched the Slayer from. The yard he'd help train the Potentials in. The spot he'd caught Dawn sneaking out of the house.

The others were still in the living room. Spike, having about as much Scooby-time as he could take, decided for a time-out. Came out here for some fresh air, for some quiet, to have a moment to himself. Entirely separate thing from brooding. He had a feeling he'd pretty much convinced everyone he was telling the truth about his most recent screw-up. Figured all were believing him when he said he really was zapped here from LA, but there was still lingering doubt. Willow wasn't so sure this was the past he was in, thought maybe it was an alternative dimension. He grew annoyed with that particular argument, being that it kept popping up.

Spike heard the door open behind him, felt that familiar presence.

"Buffy," he said, and turned his body around to look at her.

A little grin curled her lips upwards, her standing silhouetted in the doorway. "I didn't know... did you want to be alone?"

He turned back around, lifting his shoulders slightly. "I can be alone with you here," he told her. Remembered the same time she'd told him the exact same thing, only he had a feeling her saying it had been less complimentary.

He heard the door click shut, still felt her behind him, which meant she hadn't gone back in. She stood there a few more seconds, both of them silent, neither knowing how to fill the gap. And then she was taking hesitant steps towards him, and it made him feel equally hurt and happy. Happy that she was here, but hurt that she was so skittish around him.

"So," Buffy started awkwardly, standing at his side. He looked up at her voice, and she was staring off in the distance, arms wrapped around herself. She caught his movement and looked down at him, another little smile on her face. "Future guy, huh? What happens after all this?"

Spike couldn't help but return her smile, tilting his head to the side to see her better. "You looking for a 'happily ever after', or 'to be continued'?"

She broke out in a full-on grin, sitting down beside him. He watched her; little flashes of clothes and tan skin, small noises of wood creaking and the pointy heels of her boots scraping. "It's just a little... have I mentioned 'weird' yet?" She made a face, which in return deepened his smile. "'Weird'? I'm a Slayer, living on a Hellmouth, talking to a vampire - and the description I give is: weird."

Spike shrugged, tearing his gaze away from her. Let the moment happen between them, and just enjoyed the feel of her sitting by his side. Tried not to get too depressed, thinking that it might be the last. "It doesn't feel right, you know?" he asked after a bit, suddenly serious.

She studied him for a few seconds. "What do you mean?"

"Sitting here. Being happy. If you knew..." He took a deep breath, steeling himself, and looked back over at her. "Last I was, before this, before Blue and the big flash into the Past - we were fighting, Buffy. Me, your ex-Truly, Illyria, Gunn... and it was it."

She started to shift next to him, fidgeting a bit, making the old wood of the steps beneath their feet groan. "I know, you've said--"

"No," he cut her off sharply, wanting her to understand. "It wasn't just a little roll with a few demons on your typical Friday night. It was _it_. The End, roll the bloody credits. We all went into that fight knowing we weren't going to walk away from it."

She stared at him, taking in the seriousness of what he said. "Why?" she eventually asked.

"Why what?"

"Why the end? Or_how_ the end?"

He frowned, thinking things over. "Angel, real bright bloke that he is, got himself mixed in with that law firm."

"Wolfram and Hart?"

"Right. Which wasn't exactly the most brilliant of moves on his part, and - well, _you_ know him. He's not exactly a thinker, be it straight-laced goody-good, or evil sonofabitch. Head gets a bit swelled, especially with all the drivel people feed him, all that rot about being a Champion and a Hero-- once he commits to something, he won't back out."

"Yeah, he's a little set in his ways," she agreed carefully. "But... what does that have to do with the big no-going-back battle?"

"Aside from everything?" Spike answered, sighing slightly. "Wolfram and Hart isn't just a law firm, it's like a bloody corporate embodiment of all things interdimensional and demonic. And working there-- Angel's got this role, according to some, in the Greater Scheme of Things. Has these Senior Partners watching over him, playing him, countering his every effort to right things."

"Right things?"

"Yeah," Spike told her. "Good and bad, right and wrong? They're on the dark side, whereas Angel's donning the White Hat. Well, currently anyway. You know, because of that pesky little clause his soul came with?" He watched her eyes drift away from his at the mention of Angel's happy-clause, and suppressed another sigh. "They were just waiting for him to slip up. Or, maybe not even. The Poof plays a big part in the upcoming apocalypse, only no one knows for which side. And that there's your variable."

"I still don't get it," she slowly told him.

"It's not just any ol' apocalypse he's fielding both sides for, it's _The_ Apocalypse. Not some Sunnydale, run-of-the-mill battle with a Hell God, or taking out a collection of Ubervamps, either. We're talking capitalized, End of Ends, 'kiss the kids goodbye' type. And this thing with the battle, with where I last was and what we were all doing - we were jumpstarting it."

"You were _jumpstarting_ an apocalypse with all intent to_die_?"

"Well, _yeah_."

Buffy stared at him, confused. "Why?"

"Thing was, and god help me I'm gonna quote the bloody Poof,we were in a machine. The whole group of us there, working at Wolfram and Hart-- freelance or not," he added, just getting that bit of info out there again. "The Senior Partners, Buffy, they've got everything mapped out._Had_ everything mapped out, and Angel was perfectly reciting his part along with it, line for bloody line. Joining up with the Evil Law Firm just played right into their hands, mostly because it kept him busy while they set The Apocalypse in motion. It doesn't play out like it plays out here, you know. You don't get the convenient warnings and ticking clock to countdown your time to prevent it. It was just _happening_."

"It just happens and so you just - what? Decide to jumpstart it with your untimely death?"

He smirked. "Got to admit, though - they weren't expecting it. Last thing they expected was for their precious pawn to throw them a loop, but the Poof did."

"Where was I in all of this?" she asked suddenly. "Because it seems to me apocalypse equals Slayer, and yet - you're big with the no-mention."

Spike shrugged, deciding to play it casual. "Honestly, I haven't a clue where you were. Rome, I figure."

"Rome?" Buffy looked instantly interested, no doubt picturing herself as a tourist, visiting all the local attractions and more conveniently located shoe stores. She snapped herself out of it soon enough. "Wait - I was in _Rome_? Why?"

"Don't rightly know, I never really asked."

"Okay, this is weird...er. Weird_er_. There's an apocalypse, apparently, in this near future of ours, and I'm just... in Rome? Why aren't I there, why aren't I helping?"

"Because we kept you out of it?"

Buffy huffed out a little breath of air. "And what does that mean?"

"Means it wasn't your fight, so we kept you out of it."

She hardened at that, her whole body tensing. Spike could hear her blood pressure rising. "You _kept_ me out of it?" she asked incredulously. "I did mention the whole thing about 'apocalypse equals Slayer', right? It's sort of in the job description to be _kept in_."

"Bit different with this one," he told her, smiling softly.

"Why, because_you_ started it? Still," she said, shaking her head in denial. "I wouldn't just sit back and watch you and Angel go off and fight some battle I knew you wouldn't walk away from. What else aren't you telling me? Because, as nice and vague as all this has been, it's not adding up. I'm in Rome, you're in LA, _with Angel_--"

"Hey, not _with_," he countered defensively, not liking the implications. "Bound, _against_ my will--"

"Yeah, which is another thing! What'd you mean before when you said you 'burnt up heroically'?"

"You're a smart girl, Slayer, you telling me you can't figure it out yourself?"

She glared at him, those lips of hers thinning. "What games are you playing at here, Spike?"

He shook his head, letting out a bitter laugh, and decided to just go the safe route and answer her. "This thing here that you're starting - the fight with the First? Far as I know, it's one big casualty was me. You and yours got away safe, which is good. Scattered about the planet afterwards, too."

"You... _died_?" she slowly repeated, her face suddenly expressionless. "Here, now?"

"Well, not_now_, exactly--"

"_Spike_."

"Yeah, I died," he casually replied, not bothering to cover up his small smile that came with her little spark of indignation. "Heroically, mind you. At the bottom of the Hellmouth, which was good, because-- you _won_, Buffy. You come up with this plan, brilliant, all on your own, and you_win_. You destroy the Hellmouth."

That didn't seem to please her as much as he figured it would. "But you die? You're going to die?"

"_Yeah,_ but I come back," he assured her, not knowing how to go about this. She kept repeating that like it meant something to her, and it was sparking something inside he hadn't felt in months: hope. Something that felt oddly off, that he knew shouldn't be there. Couldn't be there. "Few weeks later, anyway," he added.

She brought her arms up, hugging herself, and ran her hands up down the length of them, like she was cold and trying to warm up. "This is all just... way, way too confusing. I can't even think... with all the Potentials, with Faith being here, and the First-- This thing we have to do tonight with Caleb, and now you-- it's too much."

"Wait," he said, catching the last of that sentence. "Thing with Caleb...?"

"The thing... Right, you don't remember because you're not..." She trailed off with a sigh. "Caleb says he has something waiting for me, or for all of us I guess, at the Vineyard. We're going tonight to see what it is." She glanced towards him, briefly looking him in the eye. "Well, we were, until..."

"Right, the thing..." he said, remembering. "You thinking he has another Potential there, maybe?"

"Yeah, or _something_. I'm not sure, what with the whole incredible vagueness of it--"

"Don't go."

She paused a fraction of a second, just staring at him in confusion. "What?"

"It's a trick. This thing, if it's the same... don't go. He doesn't have anything for you, Slayer. Just draws you there, makes with the bigotry, says his dramatic rot, and gouges Harris a bit."

"Gouges... wha?"

"The bloody Whelp." Off her look, he further elaborated. "He lures, we go, your favorite carpenter walks out of there with one less eyeball."

Buffy cringed beside him, and he cursed himself for the complete lack of tact he just expressed. "No," she denied strongly, forcing it out with conviction. "Nuh uh. I won't let that happen--"

"It's a_trap_, Buffy. He doesn't have a bloody thing there for you, trust me." His voice softened, determined to get her to listen to him. "I've played this out, I know how it ends-- Hey, wait a minute." He stopped, realization hitting him like a stake through the heart. "I'm actually voicing a _defense_ to keep _Xander_ safe?"

Buffy cracked a small smile at that, and eventually he felt her relax beside him again. A few moments of comfortable silence passed between them, as they both stared straight ahead. Familiar position, too. He could recall a few other times him and the Slayer'd sat like this.

"So something really happens to Xander?" she finally asked, careful to not sound too unconvinced.

"Yeah, but if you're wondering if it also makes him suddenly more useful, the answer's no."

He heard her laugh lightly, and it warmed him instantly, igniting parts of him that had long since gone cold, but she sobered the next second. The air felt heavy between them, neither saying anything for a few long moments.

"I don't know what I would do if something happened to him and it was my fault," she admitted quietly, keeping her gaze locked ahead.

"First off, it wasn't your fault," he told her, turning his body towards her. Wanted to see her better, and was tempted to reach out and touch her. Maybe push loose strands of hair behind her ear, run his fingers through the golden strands. Maybe just offer a soothing pat on the back. But he remembered all too well how their game played out. Remembered the rejection, and didn't exactly care for it, so he made the conscious effort to keep his hands locked securely across his knees, a safe distance away from her. "Harris made the choice to go himself," he continued lowly, ducking his head down to stare into her eyes. "And second of all, nothing's going to happen to him, not if you don't go."

She took a few seconds to answer, staring at him, her eyes searching his. Eventually she turned away, looking straight ahead again. "You're right. I just... I had this feeling. I was so sure that there was something there. Not just a Potential, or Caleb, it was just... " She sighed. "Whatever, I guess it doesn't matter anymore."

"I know," he said lowly, still not taking his eyes off of her. "I remember."

"I guess you do," she replied just as quietly.

He finally managed to tear his gaze off of her, staring into the backyard. There was this nagging thought in the back of his head that kept escaping his grasp, something about the Vineyard and the importance of it, but he couldn't quite remember what it was. It'd been so long since he'd thought of Sunnydale, willingly repressing the memories for his own benefit. Life in LA was hell those first few weeks, through and through. Every thought was predominantly wrapped up in Buffy, those three last words she'd said to him swimming around in his mind and messing with his sense of logic. There was a time he'd actually believed in them. When he couldn't see past anything but getting back to her. On surprise reunions, on showing up at her doorstep, alive and back and ready to hear those three words again. Then he got corporeal. Then he'd made to actually leave the sodding states, and that was when common sense came slamming in.

Buffy didn't love him. Not then, not three months after he'd saved the world, not in those few special nights they'd shared before his death-that-wasn't. Maybe in those two minutes before everything had collapsed around him, but that was it.

"We should probably get you cleaned up," Buffy said, drawing his attention back to her. "Put some bandages on those cuts..."

He did his best to look impartial, though it warmed him a bit to know she was thinking of him. Felt oddly comforting, given the fact that he'd hadn't talked to her in almost a year, not really anyway, and here she was again-- concerned, and for him. "Vampire, remember? I'll heal."

"Humor me."

He couldn't help but smile at that, and conceded. "Could use some dry clothes, maybe. Some blood."

"Lucky for you, we come freshly stocked with all of the above."

Reluctantly, Spike stood, wincing when a fresh wave of pain hit all anew. May have the vampire healing and the high tolerance for pain, but being the living embodiment of a whacked around ping bong ball due to having been on the beating end of a good, out-numbered battle - its results were just a bit more than your usual rough and tumble with a few baddies. Bruises went beyond flesh, cuts got re-opened, and all the while his ribs rubbed about in a broken sort of manner, grinding and shifting and feeling the farthest from pleasant as they moved around inside of him in ways he hadn't remembered them ever doing before. It was unnatural, and painful at that.

"Hurts?" she asked knowingly, grabbing onto his arm in an unconscious effort to hold him steady, as she too stood.

Spike immediately froze at the feel of her warm hand slipping its way under his arm, still not used to the Slayer being so gentle with him. He recovered before she'd noticed though, before his falter was obvious enough to get her to re-think her actions, and allowed her to help. "Yeah," he answered, smiling a little for her benefit. "I've felt worse, though. Take a bit more than the Hordes of Hell to do me in for good."

She returned his smile with one of her own, pulling away from him when they were both up. Not without him seeing a worried and embarrassed look flash across her face as it hit her that she was touching him, though. She covered quickly, and was across the porch and pulling open the back door before he could even blink a response. Which was fine, really, because he honestly didn't feel like getting into another internal pity party and start mentally dissecting his and hers relationship, especially being that they didn't _have_ a relationship.

"Thanks," he mumbled as he walked past, and immediately stiffened when he'd stepped back inside. The air in the room felt different, felt thicker, heavier, and... heartbeats. Bloody dozen set of alternating heartbeats sounding off. The Potentials were back.

As was Faith, who entered the kitchen the same time Buffy pulled the door shut behind them.

"Thought I heard something back here. You two slipping away for some alone time?" she playfully asked, her eyebrow raised suggestively.

"Something like that," Buffy answered.

Faith was smart enough to register the tone and dropped the subject. "So, we still on for later? You guys sort out the whole Scooby dilemma-- no problems with the breaching of Hot Pockets or anything, cause, seriously - I didn't know they were the boy's."

Buffy offered a small smile. "No... No Hot Pocket problems, and no solutions to our dilemma. At least not yet," she added, with a look thrown to Spike.

"That's good then. But tonight, the thing with this Caleb guy - we're still down for it, right?"

"Actually..." Buffy started, and then looked over at Spike. "We should probably tell the rest of them, too."

Spike replied with a shrug, supposing so. Tell the Scoobies, right. Whatever. Didn't matter to him either way, seeing as he'd already done his part by warning her not to go.

Buffy stared at him for a few seconds longer, apparently looking for a more vocal verification. He didn't feel like obliging, so she eventually turned away without another word and headed into the room still full of Scoobies. And also Potentials. Goody. He, like the lapdog that'd he'd pathetically already fallen back into the role of being, followed. He could feel Faith behind him, following too.

"Buffy!" Xander called out, jumping from the couch as the three came into view. "We were just talking about you. Seems the girls here are interested in what's going on with Wet and Bloody," he said, his voice turning frantic, with just the slightest tremble. "Oh_god_ are they interested, with the many questions, and the overwhelming amount of them, and the glares that _swear_ come pre-packaged as a Slayer perk--"

She cut him off, in that exasperated 'I'm the Boss, my time to talk' way she'd long since perfected. "Good," she replied thinly, mechanically folding her arms across her chest. "You can fill them in later. But first, I have news." She addressed the whole room, making sure Spike was at her side. He was, of bloody course. She waited until she had everyone's attention; Watcher's, witches, even the bloody boy. "We're not going to the Vineyard tonight."

"What!" a chorus from a few different Potentials loudly and immediately cut in.

"Buffy?" Giles inquired, sounding as the voice of reason. Ready there to defend his Slayer and hear her out before making with the Queen Mary impressions.

"I've got reason--" she glanced briefly towards Spike, "--to believe that Caleb's just setting us up for a trap."

"Well, duh," another Potential muttered, earning a glare from the Slayer.

"Whatdya mean, Buffy?" Xander asked, shifting to a less central part of the room. His previous spot on the couch had been filled, so he settled for awkwardly standing about. "Before, you were big with the definite belief of needing to go."

"I think thing's have changed a little since then," she told him softly.

"Right," he said, and then shot Spike a look as the realization of what her words meant hit him. "So - this is where Spike's futuristic knowledge starts to come in handy, then?"

Spike gritted his teeth when a new group of heads swiveled in his direction at that statement. There was no way he was going to sit through another version of earlier's meeting - especially this time it being with a bloody gaggle of teenage girls. He sighed, and looked at the Whelp with a look that meant he was to be taken serious. "This thing, tonight, with Caleb? It's a set-up."

Amongst the ensuing confusion from the Potentials, it was Giles who'd stepped forward. "Set-up?" he asked, frowning. "You're sure?"

"Uh, not to be subjected to the unpleasant side of a glare," Willow quietly started, staring nervously at Spike. "But... what if it's not?"

"What do you mean?" Buffy asked her.

"Well, again, with the possibility of this being another dimension entirely than, uh... this Spike's... you don't know--"

"It's not," Spike cut her off, bored with this recurring conversation. "It's the same dimension, you're the same Scoobies in the same town with the same bleeding disregard for anything coming out of my mouth."

"I didn't mean to..." Willow started apologetically.

"Look," he cut her off with a sigh. "Unless you lot fancy Harris and the Yo-Ho-Ho look, I'm thinking you might want to start backing a little faith in me."

"Hey!" Xander shouted, hearing his name and immediately getting offended. "Santa? You're comparing me to _Santa_! I've put on a little weight this year, _yeah_--"

"A _pirate_, you git. Yo ho ho?"

Xander's face reddened before relief sunk in. "Ohh, _okay_, a _pirate_." He paused. "Actually, no - still confused, and... slightly offended. I think."

"Let's just say - last time this all played out, the trip to Caleb's - your big contributing scene ended with you needing an eye patch."

"A _what_?"

Great. Another chorus of disbelief, from both Scoobies and Potentials alike.

"Caleb," Spike started to explain, albeit a bit disinterestedly. "He does this thing--"

"Luring," Buffy helpfully inserted, catching Spike's eye.

He paused, pathetically and hopelessly being undone with just that simple gesture. A good amount of his frustration and annoyance melted away, marvel the oddity. "You lot go," he continued more lightly. "Caleb doesn't have anything, just gouges an eye out. Xander's eye, to be exact."

There was a moment of silence before the eventual flutter of the Potentials set in again.

"Wait, hold on," Faith said, loud enough to draw attention to herself. She was looking at Spike in confusion. "What's going on here? You're talking like, I don't know, like you're predicting the future or something."

"Hey, let's go rocketing back to the fact that I lose an eye!" Xander cut in loudly. "All in favor of listening to our futuristic pal Spike and _not_ taking a pleasant little jaunt to the Vineyard, say aye--" His eyes widened in panic. "Punless! That was punless!"

"Yes, hi," Anya spoke up, addressing Buffy. "I like Xander's eyes. Both of them. Please don't have one taken away."

"And I'm in agreement with Anya," Xander added, turning back to look at Spike and Buffy, a bit more calm. "The less scathed I walk away from this, the better I say."

"Can we come back to those of us not belonging to the core group?" Faith asked, sounding annoyed. "Repeating: What's going on? When we left, everything was just fine and dandy. We planned us out a nice trip to visit our favorite Preacher Man, you and your vamp here were making with the patrol, free of all this psychic-type stuff, and now what? Now we're all here, huddled together in this room in a way that I _know_ isn't for of a dysfunctional group get together-- and he's suddenly Miss Cleo? I've seen some trippy stuff the past few days, but I gotta say - this is taking the cake."

"Yeah," one of the Potentials agreed, staring cautiously at Spike, like any second she expected him to bare his fangs and attack. "What's wrong with him?"

Spike felt offended at that, and was about to point out the fact that there wasn't a bloody thing wrong with him, but Buffy cut in before he could defend himself.

"You guys want to know what's going on?" she asked, and he could tell by her tone that her mood had officially switched. She was as drained and annoyed as he was, and wasn't above letting it show. She looked around the room, and when it'd went silent at her flat tone, she hardened further. "Well, do you? Faith wants to know. Rona wants to--"

"Molly, actually."

"Whatever," Buffy said, bordering on impressive lines of bitchiness. "You guys all want to know what's going on? Why we had you leave? Fine." She paused, making sure she had the focus of every last person. "Spike is from the future."

Spike bit back a sigh when the room fell into yet another round of silence.

Xander eventually broke it with a chuckle. "Gotta say, still weird to hear."

"You're serious?" one of the Potentials broke in, laughing softly. Complete disbelief in her voice. "You're telling us that this guy is from the future? And expecting us to buy it?"

Buffy blinked. "You're a girl who's been plucked from her family because a bunch of eyeless guys with knives were trying to kill you, you're living in a house full of more than a dozen strangers, some of who are either dead, demons, or witches, you're standing very much literally on a Hellmouth -- and you're _doubting_ me?"

"Uh, to be fair, Slayer - you doubted me, too."

"Shut up, Spike," she said, quickly and absentmindedly, and in a way that hit him with a bit of nostalgia before she just as soon realized she'd done it. Her face softened as she turned towards him. "Sorry," she hastily added. "Moment, annoyance, inevitable lashing out on the innocent."

Spike smirked, in a completely involuntary way. He couldn't help it. The Slayer was being so damned nice, and it was admittedly amusing. "It's okay," he said, mockingly sincere.

She, of course, picked up on the mocking, her soft look hardening. Aware of the attention they were getting, she settled for the more casual approach, and picked up where'd they'd left off since stepping back into the house. "We should probably go and get you cleaned up now."

"Don't need to," he said, impartial-like. He knew they already agreed to this outside, but, hell - who was he to pass a chance at riling the Slayer up?

"You're bleeding from the head, Spike."

He shrugged. "It's nothing."

"You're wet."

He looked down, as if it was it was just being pointed out to him. "Right," he said disinterestedly, and glanced back up to her with another impartial shrug. "Be dry in a matter of minutes."

"_Spike_."

That did it. That broke him and got a smile out of him. "Getting a bit testy now, are we? Take deeper breaths, it'll help."

She glared. "Upstairs. Bathroom. Now."

"Bossy little chit," he said, affecting a pout.

"Annoyingly suicidal vampire," she matched.

He huffed, smiling. Falling so easily and so comfortably back into a form of banter that hadn't existed between the two of them in years. "Haven't even been here an hour, and you're already back to belittling me."

"_Okay_ then," Xander said, drawing nosey teenage eyes off of Buffy and Spike and over to him. "Are you leaving this up to us to explain?" he asked, staring at Buffy.

She looked apologetic for a second, embarrassed even. "Yeah, is that okay? Can you guys answer questions and fill them in with what's going on?"

"Can, and even better - will. I'm feeling oddly rejuvenated after that enlightening tidbit about losing my eye, which..." He started to look a little panicked again. "We're _not_ going tonight, right?"

Buffy smiled. "Relax, Xander. We're not going."

"Good, good."

Buffy waited for anymore objections, for any last questions, and getting none, she turned to Spike.

He took that as his cue to make with the movement, and headed for the stairs, with her following not far behind.

"Now," the Whelp was saying, in his most 'important grown-up' voice. "What's going on with Spike is a little trip between the spans of time. Your classic case of _Back To The Future_, if you will..."


End file.
